Christmas Time!

We decided to put up our tree the weekend after TJ's party. We had most of our Christmas decorations put up the day after Thanksgiving but we knew the tree would take up a lot of room and wanted to wait so there were not extra cedar needles all over the place!

Andi, TJ and Travis set out to get the tree (on a cold Friday a little before the sun went down). They found a nice huge tree fairly quickly but arrived home without one because TJ and Andi were whining because it was cold (come on at least 30 something! lol) and they couldn't walk anyways with all of their winter gear on (think Christmas story :) )

When they got home, I threw out the idea of an artificial tree for the first time as I was trying to remember where we put the "Christmas tree blanket" and other blankets to cover some furniture as we would have to get it from the front door to the living room. I did not have much argument and even though I still miss the smell of cedar and the idea of having a real tree, we set out Saturday morning to find the "perfect" artificial tree in Quincy.

our new tree... It was definitely less painful as we decorated for the kids and it seems to be lots sturdier than our trees in the past, which is definitely a good thing so we have no corner to put (protect) our tree in this year and it is open from 3 sides!

TJ's excitement after hanging his first ornament on. This kids LOVES Christmas and we hear lots of girly shrieks from him when we see Christmas trees, lights, presents etc. :)

He is quite the decorator as you can tell from his ornament arranging.

He took time to hang each one on the same limb at the exact spot. We had lots of hooks over top one another. You should have seen the tinsel- even better!

The finished product- officially ready for Christmas. The kids loved decorating and helping wrap presents. It did take longer but it was worth it!

They did so well with ours we couldn't wait to help decorate Grandma Mari's and this past weekend we went and helped along with Kyle and Stephanie.
Stephanie was brave enough to climb and use the ladder.

TJ decorating.

Andi really liked decorating with Grandma Mari, she loved all of her ornaments!

Even Kyle "Tom" helped. That through TJ for a loop "Kyle Tom? No Kyle not papa Tom!"

umm Stephanie what are you doing?! LOL :)

And as always there was a little mischief.

Cooper loves bouncing especially when Andi and TJ aren't helping!

TJ wearing a "new" hat and trying to be cool like Andi.