Sam's Class' Christmas Party

It dawned on me this year that I'm somewhat of an anomaly among preschool parents in that I do not dress my kids up in themed colors for holidays. They don't own orange and black clothes for Halloween, nor do they have jumpers with embroidered cornucopia on them for Thanksgiving. At their school Christmas parties, they were the odd men out because they weren't dressed in some combination of red and green. Is this a Southern thing? Do I lack holiday spirit? Well, bah humbug! I think it's WEIRD!

Finishing up dessert in his classroom

I made you a gift, Mom!

Check out the gingerbread village Sam's class decorated together in the upper, left-hand corner of the picture. The work of 12 two-year-olds!

He's showing me the cookie he decorated. Yum!

Jack's Christmas Play

Mrs. Terry welcomes the families to the Christmas program

Jack and his buddy are the oxen. At first, I was a little offended that he was given such a menial role--surely, Jack is worthy of a greater role at the birth of Jesus Christ...until I found out that somebody else's child was given the role of donkey. Then, I was fine with oxen. I do have to say, though, the donkey rocked it!

The whole class depicting the nativity scene. They each had speaking or moving parts, and they sang some fun songs.

My little oxen!

Sick Day

A nasty cold took down all three of my boys!

A cold on top of two injuries (one between the eyes, and one on lip and nose) really stinks! Getting him to blow his nose was challenging:(

At least Mom and Dad let us watch all this TV. Backyardigans, anyone?

Running Club

Here is our crazy group--well, not all of us, but those of us who were around for Thunder Road. This was my 6th 1/2 marathon (4th of 2010). Looking forward to a few more in 2011!

NOT the Christmas Card!

I took the boys to the greenway bridge for a little photo shoot in early December, hoping to get a good shot for our Christmas cards. Unfortunately, none of these made the cut, but we still got some fun ones. The boys were very confused that we were going to the greenway, yet Mom wasn't wearing running clothes:)

Using the timer on the camera, we got this shot of the three of us!

Hi, Jack!

"I'm so cold, and I'm getting over a cold...where's the hot chocolate you promised me, Mom?"

Caught ya! I kept running from side to side on top of the bridge as he ran side to side beneath the bridge.

Strong man, holding up the bridge!

Pete-y is here!

Pete-y, our elf (Elf on the Shelf), flew in last night from the North Pole and landed in a vase on our mantel. We couldn't believe it--it's been almost a year since we've seen him, but he looks just the same! If you've never heard of Elf on the Shelf, it is a Christmas tradition for children and families. Basically, Santa sent us an elf back in 2009. We named him Pete-y (but we are never allowed to touch him). He arrives every morning in a different place in our house (starting a few weeks before Christmas). He watches what we do all day, and then he reports back to Santa at night. It's fun to find him every morning--where will he show up next? The chandelier? The top of the Christmas tree? We never know where we'll find him!

Pete-y was in the vase on our mantel this morning, but no one noticed, and we were half-way through breakfast before Jack screamed out, "Pete-y! Pete-y's here!" I started cracking up because I had totally fogotten that I put him out....ummm, I mean that Santa told me Pete-y would be here:)

Pete-y, the elf. Santa's helper/mom's bargaining tool

Jack: Mom, will you read me one more book?

Me: No, we've read all the books we're going to read tonight. It's bedtime.

Jack: NO! I want to read one more.

Me: Jack, really? Do you want to disobey Momma on Pete-y's first night here? What do you think he's going to tell Santa when he heads back to the North Pole tonight?

>>>Jack climbs into bed and when I ask him what we should pray for tonight, he says, "Pete-y."

The Santa Chronicles

Well, it's that time of year...Santa has come to town! We visited Santa on Friday, so I thought I'd do a retrospective pictorial of the Wilcox boys and Santa Claus. Enjoy!

2006

Jack's 1st Christmas (9 mos. old)

2007
Jack's 2nd run-in with Santa (21 mos.)

2008

Sam's first Christmas (9 mos. old)

2008

Jack's 3rd Christmas (33 mos. old)

2009

I knew this was going to happen, but I thought it might be okay if Jack were with him...nope!

(Sam 21 mos., Jack almost 4)

2010

I'm cautiously going to predict that we will be tear-free from here on out:)