Christmas Eve and Christmas Day

Christmas Eve is spent at my mom and dad's house. All the boys come over and we do our gifts and partying Christmas Eve night.

Mom thought it would be funny if all the boys wore antlers. I guess Eric really liked his. Ava has no idea what is going on with her crazy uncles.

Lindsey and I started a tradition of making sugar cookies for Santa. It was really fun decorating all the cookies and I hope next year Ava can really enjoy helping us. Here are our beautiful cookies. We had the boys judge and most of my cookies won!!

Ava with all the goodies that Santa brought her. She was a really good girl!!

3rd Grade Tacky shirts!!

As posted earlier my 3rd grade team made tacky sweatshirts. Tacky being the key word. Many people thought they were really cute and they were, but they were made to be tacky and funny. Here we are on Friday before the break wearing our one of a kind sweatshirts. We also have on Christmas earrings that were out of control!!

Christmas at The Hiett's

Sunday we had Christmas with the Hiett's. Everyone was there and it was a house full. It was so great to see everyone. Ava really got some neat gifts. A snow globe from Uncle Barry, Aunt Cheryl, Nicole, and Bradley; bath toys from Uncle Stacy, Aunt Angie, Lauren, Ashley,and Tiffany; An Elmo book from Uncle Lanny, Aunt Sherrie, Jake, and Lana; and a ballerina doll and gold bracelet from Grandmommy and Granddaddy. It was a lot of fun and Ava loved all the excitement and people watching.

Chris's Grandparents and his cousins

Ava opening up her presents

Cousin Nicole

Uncle Steve's Christmas dinner at Bone's

We had our annual Christmas dinner with Uncle Steve Saturday night at Bone's. As usual it was delicious and we all were stuffed. I have attended Uncle Steve's Christmas dinner for probably the last 6 or 7 years and I thought this was one of the best. The appetizers were out of this world. We had a seafood platter with lobster, crab, and shrimp, onion rings, some sort of mash potato puffs that were fried, and my favorite fried green tomatoes. Not to mention the main course of fillet minion and creme brulee for dessert. Chris doesn't really eat dessert so we took his creme brulee home and I had it for breakfast the next morning. Yum Yum!!

Me and Adrienne stuffed!!

Brothers: Shane, Chris, Brandon

Most of the family

Ava's 1st Christmas present

Thanks Dallas!!! You Rock!!

Piece by piece

Ava received her very first Christmas present today from her best friend in 4th grade Dallas. Dallas is one of my favorite students and is always so kind and sweet to think of both me and Ava. Ava loved opening up her present. She tore one little piece of wrapping paper at a time. she also liked to try to eat the paper. Not only did she love unwrapping her present, but she loved playing with her present. It was a super cute rolling telephone with moving eyes and a dial that makes noise. It was almost as awesome has the present Dallas gave me: Bootcamp Barbie!!! Dallas knows that I love Barbies and the Bootcamp Barbie is AWESOME!!! For those of you who don't know I completed a fitness bootcamp in October. It nearly kicked my tail but I did it. It was really hard but I finished it and have been eating healthier and working out ever since.

Just a note to all of you getting me Christmas presents Bootcamp Barbie is going to be pretty tough to beat!!

Happy Birthday Aunt Lindsey!!

Ava couldn't resist getting her Aunt Lindsey a Cabbage Patch 25th Anniversary for her birthday. Aunt Lindsey was very excited about her new doll Sadie. We met at La Parilla to celebrate!! Happy Birthday Aunt Lindsey!!

Ava really enjoyed her lemon. It kept her entertained the whole time we ate.

She knew it was sour but she kept putting it in her mouth.

Merry Christmas Topher

Chris loves electronics and gadgets. Every year before Christmas he spends his Christmas money before he ever gets it. This year he decided he wanted a new TV. Did yall need a new TV you ask?? Well no, but with all the new technology out Chris was having a fit for a new one. The old TV Chris bought before we got married so it was 4 or 5 years old but it wasn't a flat screen so it had to go. There was absolutly nothing wrong with it but it has found a new home in the bedroom upstairs. Chris said when we get our new house ( which is looking like that may be never) it will be nice to have in our game room. We got the new TV and a stand to put it on and it makes the living room look much neater and organized. Even though I thought the purchase was pretty dumb the TV is really cool and big!! We do watch a lot of TV so we will get a lot of use out of it!! Here are some funny pictures of the boys putting it all together.

This was the construction of the stand. Yes it took all 4 of them

Nice butt shot of MikeTa Da!! Watching Eric's favorite show Cops on the new TV

I don't even think this picture needs a caption!!

3rd Grade Team Building!!

If you don't already know I LOVE the girls I work with. We have the best team this year. Our work Christmas party this year was a tacky Christmas theme. We thought it would be cool if we all made our own tacky shirts. So last Saturday we met up at Christina's to paint our shirts. We had lunch and snacks then got busy on our shirts. Bring on the puff paint!!

Katie, Christina, me, Angela
My shirt: Rudolph (my foot and hands)

Angela's shirt

Christina's shirt (notice the googly eyes)

Christmas Pictures

Aunt Lindsey and I took Ava to see Santa on Monday. When I first sat her in his lap she didn't look at him and was fine. She didn't smile, but she didn't cry. Then Santa thought it would make a nice picture if he looked at her and she looked at him. The picture was perfect and all was good. then she turned her head away from him and started crying. I went and picked her up and she held on to me like her life depended on it. It was really sort of funny to watch but not so funny to Ava. Santa was really nice and came and stood by the tree with us so we could get some pictures with my camera. I didn't have the good camera so the pictures Lindsey took are not great (Santa looks good, but my eyes are closed and Ava is trying grab the tree on my shirt).

This was one of the pictures for the Christmas cards. This is a good picture because her new thing is sticking her tongue out.

Game Day..... Go Dawgs!!

We were trying to get a good picture of Ava in her Christmas dress in front of the tree, but of course she wasn't in the mood. She did however like it when Uncle Mike held her in front of the tree, I guess Ava and Uncle Mike may be the Christmas card this year . We will try again another day.

Ava with Uncle Mike and Uncle Eric

Thanksgiving

It was a lovely Thanksgiving at the Sansbury's this year. We enjoyed great food and great company from family that we do not see nearly enough. I did not take very many pictures but here were a few I did take.

Chris and Mama

Ava and Marvin the Cat

She's mobile!!!

Ava is finally crawling!! She isn't real fast yet but she is on the move. I am going to spend the weekend Ava-proofing the down stairs!!

Sorry I've been slow with the post. I have been busy and I need new batteries for one of the cameras. When I get batteries I will post some video.

We love our neighbor!!

Here are some pictures of the $700 worth of damage a tree from our yard did to our neighbor's car. Last Saturday at about 5:30am I heard a loud boom. I looked out the window and saw that this dead tree that Chris had been meaning to cut down fell in the neighbor's yard. I could see that it missed their house so I thought we were good. Then at about 8:00 I heard the doorbell ring and knew right away who it was. It was the neighbor and the tree hit her car. We thought it was only the windshield, but when they took it in it also dented the hood. Needless to say we had to pay the $700 to get the car fixed. Merry Christmas to us!!!

Girl's Night Out.....Painting Pottery

So it is that time of the month again...... Girl's Night Out!!!! My favorite time of the month is when some girls from work get together and do something fun. This paticular night out I was really excited about. Leisa came up with a great idea for us to go to a place called All Fired Up and paint our own pottery. I have been looking online for a few months on a plate for Ava to use on her birthdays. I hadn't found just what I was looking for so when Leisa suggested going to a place where we could paint our own pottery I knew that would be perfect for me to make Ava's birthday plate. I wanted something special that she will be able to eat off of for her birthdays every year. There were so many pieces to choose from that it was really hard to decide but finally I found just the plate that I had imagined. It was very stressful at first picking out colors and deciding how I was going to design the plate because I knew it would be something that I will be seeing for years to come. After a lot of thought I started to paint it. I am not that creative or artistic so i started off really nervous but after awhile I got the hang of it and I am really excited about how it turned out. I won't get to see the final product until Wednesday because they have to be fired.

Lindsey painting a present for Grant for his birthday

Group shot: me, Christina, Lindsey, Leisa, and Cheryl The plate before the paint

Ta da!! The colors will be darker once fired but you get the idea!!

I don't know what we are doing next month for Girl's Night Out but this night is going to be hard to beat!!! We had so much fun we are thinking about going back next week to paint something else.