Christmas in Conway

After church on Sunday, we headed for Conway to have Christmas with Graham's family.

Can you guess what this is?

"Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair!"

The hair from the wig was EVERYWHERE!   I tried to tame it by braiding it.  Graham helped me out.

True Grit bound...Are these guys related?

Winter Facelift and Desktop Background

The blog is ready for a long winter.

Christmas Kids

Our Christmas KIDS!  It's plural this year and...I love it.

Check out my Christmas KID from last year here.

It's amazing that Edy is almost a year old, but she wasn't with us last year (technically).  

Home for Christmas

It was so nice to spend Christmas day at our house as a family.   The whole day we stayed in our pajamas and played, ate, played, ate, played, cleaned, oh...and ate!  I just loved the time spent with my girls and my husband.  

The girls enjoyed their gifts and we enjoyed watching their excitement.  I'll close with these pictures from our day.

Look who's...

waLKing!

Edy's walking! from Leslie Hale on Vimeo.

Edy Grows - 11 months

Other than taking your first steps, not much has changed with you this month.  I can't believe we are almost ready to celebrate your first birthday! I love you, Rose Bud.

New Red Coats

O Tannenbaum!

Brave AKA Braid

How pitiful is this brAiD?

BUT...there's a little girl in East Texas that is SO proud of it!  Ha!   

 She calls it her "brave".  I'd say you have to be pretty brave to sport that! Mama has some pretty mad bad braidin' skills!  Especially with that baby-fine, layered, curly, hair.

Me, AG, and the "brave"

Sigh

I'm missing ALL of my Fort Smith buddies...and their sweet children.

I knew this would happen.

It's true...Good friends are hard to come by...And I have some Real Pals!

Photo-op fail!

This is what I'm workin' with...

Gotta love my feisty little chicas!

Reindeer Games

On Saturday, we headed back to Grapevine for more Christmas fun.  Ava Grace enjoyed the Christmas village.

Santa and his elves were playing "reindeer games"  and asked all of the kids to join them. 

After the games, Aunt Dorothy, Graham, and Ava Grace went on a wagon ride.

This is one worn out kid!

Quick Visit

While in Dallas, we got to catch up with Aunt Cherie and Uncle Wayne.  It was SO good to see them.  This was their first time to meet Edy Rose.  

Their house is all decked out for Christmas--it's gorgeous.

 
You are kidding me...their tree has a train under it! How cool is that. *from the mind of AG*
 Of course, AG loved it.

Just take a look at that beautiful tree.

Cherie and Wayne, we are looking forward to more time together at Christmas.  Wayne, I still haven't forgotten about our Apples to Apples controversy.  I hear we have a new game this year--it's on!

Polar Express

Friday night, we headed to Grapevine, TX (self-proclaimed Christmas Capitol of Texas) to ride the Polar Express.  I think it was called something else (North Pole Express), but Ava called it the Polar Express, so we went with it.  It. was. incredible.

We grabbed a bite to eat before boarding the train.  Edy used her new found communication-- signing "more".

 There was a quick show before the train ride.  It was really cute.

 They played Christmas carols before the show started and Ava danced her little heart out!

By the way, all of the children wore their pajamas.  It was adorable...take my word for it!

 more dancing...

Here are some videos from the show:


Polar Express from Leslie Hale on Vimeo.


Jingle Bells from Leslie Hale on Vimeo.

 After the show, we headed outside to board the train. As we walked through the Christmas Tree Maze, it began to snow (man-made, of course).

 We were the first to climb aboard.

In awe.

Getting our tickets punched

This was such an incredible experience for the girls.  I can't wait to go back next year.   Making Memories!