Christmas Images

What's under the tree? Is there anything for me?

Playing at the mall after visiting Santa

A South Carolina Christmas

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Flip Flops in December

It is around 70 degrees today and I am wearing flip flops. There's just something not right about wearing flip flops while Christmas shopping! Don't get me wrong......I love my flip flops and would love to wear them most all the time but Christmas is one exception. It just doesn't feel like Christmas to me if there isn't a chill in the air. Hopefully it will get a little colder next week before Santa arrives.

Santa

Yesterday after school I decided I would get the girls ready and head to the mall to have their picture taken with Santa. I didn't have many more days that I could work it into the schedule so I decided to go to South Park Mall (which is farther away and quite a bit more traffic in that area of town) so I could kill 2 birds with 1 stone: Santa picture and get a gift from Caswell Massey that I need before next week since it's the only one around here. But as the time approached I just dreaded driving to that mall and back in traffic and then getting home late and still having to eat and do homework, bath night, etc. So I wimped out and went to Carolina Place Mall instead which is only 15 minutes from the house. We got lucky and got in line just before they shut the line down so they could finish so Santa could go on his dinner break.

Elisabeth wasn't sure about the whole sitting on Santa's lap idea and I could tell by the look on her face when we were next in line that she was definitely reconsidering. She looked up at me and said "No. I'm not sitting on his lap. I'll stand beside him but I'm not sitting in the chair or on his lap." As we approached Santa much to our surprise.....he started speaking Chinese to Elisabeth. It wasn't what I expected and I didn't know what to say. She said Ni Hao (hello) back to him and he continued to speak English and Chinese to Ansley and Elisabeth. The first picture was of Ansley sitting on Santa's knee and Elisabeth standing beside Ansley. Then as Santa continued to joke and talk with them he moved Ansley to the other knee and picked Elisabeth up and sat her on this chair beside him. Then after more talking he picked her up and put her on his knee. I don't even think she realized it! Boy he's good! The picture turned out so cute and much to my surprise they are both on his lap. I spoke to him a few minutes afterwards and found out he grew up in Hong Kong as a missionary kid and that's how he knows how to speak Chinese. Is that cool or what? What are the odds of finding a Chinese speaking Santa. That made my day!

O Christmas Tree, O Christmas Tree

Enjoying hot chocolate after a cold day at the Christmas tree farm
This marshmellow is very yummy1

View of the tree farm from the top of the mountain

This is our tree!

Ducks standing on the frozen lake. It was cold that day!

We headed to the mountains of North Carolina the first weekend in December to get a Christmas tree. I know we could go to the lot down the street and get one but when we can we try and make a whole day of going to get the tree and cut it down in the mountains. It's a different experience every time and one that we talk about and remember year after year. The kids really enjoy it. This year we went to Sugar Plum Tree Farm in Plumtree, NC. It was about a 3 hour drive and was extremely cold that day. Ansley got her wish.......it snowed while we were there. It was very neat to be picking a tree in the snow but we were so cold we couldn't feel our fingers or toes anymore! We picked a beautiful tree and ended up staying at the tree farm for hours. They had lots of actitivies: meeting with Santa, sitting in the warm indoors eating popcorn and drinking hot chocolate, shopping in their Christmas store and roasting marshmellows in the fire pit outside. It was a fun day!!

The human hamster wheel

Trying to run over Uncle Scott

Our neighbors gave this to the girls a few weeks ago. We took it to Conyers with us at Thanksgiving. They had a blast playing in it and it was great because it wore them out!

Ice Skating

Ansley loves going to the outdoor ice skating rink every year during the holidays

Elisabeth taking a break from ice skating with Grandmother and Poppy

I am having so much fun!

Elisabeth Ice Skating with Grandpa

Such a ham

We went ice skating at the outdoor rink in Conyers, GA while we were there for Thanksgiving. We go every year. Ansley loves it and so did I until I fell on the ice 2 years ago and am convinced I broke my tailbone. Haven't skated since. I just sit off to the side and take pictures and video. I'll get back out there eventually. This is Elisabeth's first year skating. She had a great time but Ron and John were very tired afterwards since they are the ones that had to help her skate. She couldn't really hold herself up at all. Enjoy the pictures!

Wordless Wednesday

(I know it's wordless Wednesday but I just have to add that our poor dogs are abused. Poor Winston is wearing a pink headband with a bow. Who knows what they will do next!)

Happy Belated Thanksgiving

I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving. We traveled to Conyers and had a great time visiting family. We didn't participate in Black Friday shopping......I just couldn't make myself get up early and be out with all the crowds! We stayed in bed and slept instead! We brought our puppy, Belle, with us to Conyers and she did really well traveling in the car. She slept the whole time. She enjoyed running around outside at Ron's and even got her feet wet in the lake. We'll have to bring her back in the Spring or Summer to do some real swimming. :-)

Unfortunately we came back to some bad news. First a teacher's assistant at Ansley's school passed away the day after Thanksgiving and then our neighbor's daughter passed away on Monday morning. She was in 10th grade. It is so very sad. It has been a rough week so far to say the least.