Basketball Games and Homemade Pizzas

A guy in our old ward posted on Facebook that he had two free tickets to a Memphis Tigers (the University here) Basketball Game.  Justin decided to snag them up and take Jackson on a Daddy/Son Outing.  We all know how much Jackson LOVES sports, and he was just in heaven being there with his Dad cheering on the Tigers.  They even won.  

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The past few Saturdays have been kind of "blah" around here, so I came up with a fun activity for the family.  We went to the store, bought some ingredients for some homemade pizza's and rented a "Mr. Popper's Penguins" from Redbox to watch together.  (Jackson called it "Pop the Penguins" heehee)

I thought it would be fun, but I didn't really anticipate the boys would have SOOO much fun making the pizzas.  They LOVED it!

1st- we spread the sauce:

Then we sprinkled on the cheese.  (Which by the way don't buy the Kroger "value" brand.  It was super cheap, but I didn't realize that it is fake/imitation cheese.... yeah, our pizza didn't come out tasting too good)

And last, added the pineapples and Canadian bacon toppings.

Here is Jackson with "his" pizza  

And Jonahs!  

Jonah is so funny when we get out the camera to take a picture of him.  He squints the eyes, and opens his mouth to smile.  I was telling him to "OPEN" his eyes and this is what he thought I meant.  He holds his eyelids down with his fingers when he "closes" his eyes.  haha it makes me laugh!

Having ourselves a Merry Little Christmas

Alright... I official deserve the "attagirl" reward.  After being behind on the blog all year long, I am officially caught up!!  (yes, I am patting myself on the back as we speak) :)

As mentioned previously, we took our last long Christmas Break ever!! to head up to Illinois to spend Christmas with Justin's family.  This was the first Christmas that Jordan has been home from his mission, and probably the last time the entire family will be together for Christmas.  We really enjoyed it other than the sickness that made the rounds.  (Yes literally every one caught it minus Justin, Jackson, and Brooklyn) 

Christmas Eve:

Opening up jammies and ornaments from mom and dad

Matching football jammies!! What could be better?!

Along with every photo "session"... a silly one! (I love it!)

Traditional Christmas Eve reading of the stories.

Ella and I became good friends.  She likes me, her parents(obviously), grandma & grandpa, and Holly(the dog).  I am so happy I would be the one that she would come to every now and again!

We went to the mall that day and the kiddo's got to visit Santa again.  Here they are coloring their coloring books that he gave to them.

The building of the gingerbread's didn't go to well for Justin and I this year... our idea of a pointed roof failed us.  I think its because we got the first batch of frosting and it was a bit too runny.  We tried many attempts to making it work, such as the blow dryer... didn't help. We finally just threw something together that would stand.  I don't have any photos of the final product... but don't worry, your not missing out on much.

And the 17 stocking were hung by the chimney with care, in hopes that St. Nick would find all the grandkids at Grandma and Grandpas that night!!

Christmas Day:

That Santa never fails!!!  We were happy to see that he knew right where everyone was!

The boys got to open one present before church.  Grandma and Grandpa Blake got them their adorable Christmas Church clothes to sport.

All the cousins looked so cute in their Christmas Outfits, and we didn't even have it planned for them to all match!  

After church, we came home and enjoyed the chaos of opening presents.  The boys opening G&G presents.  (Poor Donna had to get the sickness on Christmas Day.  She spent the morning resting while we were at church but at least was able to manage to come out and enjoy the present time)

Other happenings:

We did a lot of this... lounging around!  It was so nice.  I loved the picture of Jackson snuggled between his Aunt Jamie and Uncle Jordan.

After most everyone headed back home, we stayed a few days later.  Donna took us to the Children's Discovery Center one afternoon.  It is such a cool Children's museum and we all really loved it.  

Their was a sports section and we had to get a picture of our football player in his uniform!

Jonah learning how to draw the "snoopy" character.

There was also this cool thing where you could stand in the middle of a bubble.  

Look closely at Jonah's reaction... it was priceless!!

We finally decided to head back to Memphis after 10 days of fun.... Jackson somehow got a hold of the camera on the way home and amazingly took these crazy weird self portraits.  I am not even sure how he could do this... thats talent right there people!

I snapped this random picture when we got home of the boys in their Jackson Hole Jammies from G&G Blake.  I love them... so cute!!

Be Jolly, By Golly!

Christmas is so fun with kids.  The magic of it all is sparkles in their eyes.

A fun thing about having "Tender Tennessee Christmas's" is the holiday parades.  (They don't have parades for the 4th, but they sure throw some good ones in December)
It is full of: Bundled up children, Candy tossing, Tractor pulling, Christmas Stockings, jingle belling ringing, Merry Christmas yelling, and the big guy in Red riding a top the Red fire engine!  

When Justin got the tree set up Jonah exclaimed, "Wooow!!" and Jackson said "It's beautiful".  Those words say it all...

Santa came to our ward party and the kids were so excited!!  He came in at the end of the night when the program was about over.  As soon as Jackson saw him he gasped and said, "Santa's here!!"  He then ran from the back of the room where we were sitting right up to him.  It was so cute to see his excitement.  Here he is standing in line to sit on his lap.

I wondered how Jonah would do this year as last year he wanted NOTHING to do with him... he got right up there, but seemed a bit nervous.  

Late the month we also took the boys to the winter wonderland at Bass Pro Shop.  We just heard about it this year and was disappointed we didn't know about this the other years.  They have free activities for the kids to do and free pictures with the big guy... that's right people, FREE!

Cookie decorating

Shot gun shootin' (come on, we were at Bass Pro Shop...)

We spent our Christmas vacation in Illinois with Justin's entire family.  The night before we left, as the boys were cleaning up their toy room, they found a surprise package under the tree.  There was a note saying that Santa heard we were going to Grandma and Grandpa's house for Christmas and he thought the kids might enjoy this gift for the ride there.  He then told them that they had to keep being good boys and he would bring the rest of their presents to Grandma's on Christmas Day.

Any guesses at what it could be???

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That's right!  Duel Screen DVD player!!  :)

A Day of Thanksgiving

Justin's parents and brother Jeff came to spend Thanksgiving with us.  I was excited to try to do most of the cooking myself (or course Donna helped) and to host the feast at our home.
I bought some  nutter butter crackers and kisses and let the boys make some mini acorn cookies while we were cooking in the kitchen.  

Jackson is really into helping cook things, so he had a lot of fun with it... Jonah had fun eat the kisses! ;)

We had a yummy feast and I got a lot of compliments from everyone about the meal... especially the delicious marinated turkey (the BEST way to cook a turkey) and my amazing gravy (which even though I don't like gravy, apparently I make some good one).  Thank you to the Johnson's for enjoying it with us!

Later that night we had to do our traditional turkey bowling.  Here's Grandpa helping JoJo roll the ball down the lane.