The Holidays

The holidays this year were my favorite so far. Not only because we now have Jax with us, but because Carter understood so much more. It tugged at my heart strings. I'm behind on my blogging so here's a post of Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Years all rolled into one! 

Thanksgiving:

This year we ran the annual Pima Turkey Trot 5k with our friends, the Weech's. I finally beat Don for the first time so I felt pretty good about that ;) I ran it in 28 minutes which wasn't my best, but not too shabby either. We definitely worked for that turkey! 

We ate at Don's brother's house. The amount of pies we had was outrageous. My favorite thing we had was a cranberry pomegranate jelly that my sister in law made for the turkey. It was soooo good. I just ate it plain. After we ate, some of us fell into a turkey coma while the rest went Black Friday shopping. 

Christmas:

Christmas was so magical this year. I'll tell you why. 

Having a baby at Christmas is so fun. Jax was curious about everything. The bottom of our tree was trashed! Lights and beads were strewn across the floor. The ornaments kept getting rearranged by Carter. It was definitely a family tree and I wouldn't have it any other way.

Carter and Jax got to meet Mexican Santa! When I found out Santa was at a frozen yogurt place, we were there! 

I made a snowman breakfast for the family one morning.

Don and I went to an ugly sweater party. We won the best sweater contest. I love when I get to use my creative skills for dumb things like this. Also, they have a white elephant gift exchange at this party every year. And every year there's a framed naked picture of one of our single guy friends that goes around (don't worry, the goods are covered) and the lucky person who gets it, gets to wrap it up for the next year's ugly sweater party. It is absolutely hilarious. 

Carter and Jax helped me make cookies. Carter ate at least half of them. 

Every year the Thompson's have a family Christmas party. We eat pizza, go for a sleigh ride, play games, and the grand kids act out the nativity. This year was the best one we've had.  

The sleigh ride consists of my father in law decking out a trailer in lights and hooking it up to the back of his truck. We sit on bails of hay, wrapped up in blankets, drink hot cocoa and sing obnoxiously all around the neighborhood while we look at lights. It's awesome. 

The kids did the nativity so reverently this year. It was so good. 

My cute little shepherd 

That's not even all the grand kids either. 

Christmas Eve was very special. We had dinner at Gary and Carol's and watched the cartoon Living Scriptures Nativity. Carter was really into it. When King Herod ordered his guards to kill all the baby boys, Carter was distraught. We had to rewind it and show him baby Jesus was okay. It was so sweet! 

After we watched the movie we went to our house to open our Christmas pajamas, and put our stockings on the couch for Santa. Carter also got to put baby Jesus up on our advent calendar. It's a tradition Don did when he was a kid with the same advent calendar from his mom.

Carter at first put his stocking on his foot and walked around. He didn't quite understand what we were doing with giant socks. 

Jax showing off his Christmas jammies.

We went to my sister in law's house for Christmas morning this year. This was her oldest boy's last year as a kid at home. It took HOURS to open presents because there was so many of us, but I loved that it took awhile! It's the best part about Christmas! 

Now that is a lot of presents! 

Jax getting help opening presents 

Jax slept most of the morning on me like this 

Carter was ecstatic about his new train set. This boy is obsessed with trains! 

My nephew, Devon and his awesome shirt 

Dallin

Justin, Jarrett, and Gary 

Tilghman, Brynn, and Liz

Carol had surgery in December. Poor lady was hurting, but she was a trooper.

After we opened presents we had a big breakfast then played with our toys. I made a Christmas dinner that night too. We had a wonderful Christmas. Carter still comments how all the Christmas lights are gone. I think it made him sad when it was all over. Can't wait till next year! 

New Years:

We invited a few friends over for food and games, but no one could make it! Luckily, Liz and her kids came over and played games with us till 2 in the morning. It was a fun night! We even got some snow which was so fun! Huge snowflakes were falling from the sky. Jax loved it! 

Little man partied with us till 1 am. 

The next morning we hurried and played in our little snow before it melted! 

When it snows you have to build a snowman. Even if it only snowed a millimeter. 

We hope everyone had a magical Christmas season as we did!