Christmas pictures take 4 - Christmas evening

We exchanged gifts with Shawn's Dad and his wife Christmas evening after dinner.

Here is Shawn with his new sweater and jeans. No, the Elmo outfit did not belong to him ;P

Delainey opening and Cait thinking about helping.

Eli opening. Doesn't he look a lot like his Pop?

Just because she is cute!

Cait getting into the presents unwrapping!

Our cousin Kara put together a collage of pictures from Loren and Myra's wedding. We framed it and that was their gift. You can see Kara's work at www.karaguffeyphotography.com

Delainey and Loren playing with Cait's new stacker.


I call this picture "Too much candy!"

Today we will be having Christmas lunch with Shawn's grandma on his Mom side. Then we will be traveling to Effingham to have Christmas with the entire File side of the family. So more pics to come!

Christmas pictures take 3 - Christmas morning

So after everyone left on Christmas Eve, the kids got all dressed in their jammies.

We went outside to feed Santa's reindeer.....

I have no idea why the picture looks so flaky. Maybe the reindeer food?

We left Santa milk, carmel corn, and an oreo bonbon. Delainey played along very well and even made a note for Santa with her new alphabet stamp kit.

Santa did not disappoint! He gave Delainey a pink razor scooter, Eli an ultimate omnitrex, and Cait a Mommy knows doll.

Eli's gold gift was a Nintendo DS with a game and travel accessories set. His myrrh gift was a sweatshirt and a Ben 10 shirt. For his frankensense gift, he got his first Bible!

Delainey's gold gift was the American girl doll Kit along with her books. She recieved shoes for her myrrh gift. Then for her frankensense gift, she got a devotional.

Cait got a box of small toys for her gold gift. She got LOTS of clothes for her myrrh gift since that is what she truely needed. Then she got a little book about God for her frankensense gift.

I'm yawning in this pic! HAHA

Look what I got! A 100-300mm lens for my camera! Go Shawn!!! He also got me a nice bag for the camera and lenses.

I got to try it out at a hockey game this week - it's great!

Shawn had the camera so I didn't get a picture of him opening gifts. I got him clothes and a digital picture frame. This pic is of him icing cinnamon rolls after all the present opening - I was playing with my new lens!



Next up - Christmas with Loren and Myra!

Christmas pictures take 2 - Christmas Eve

Here are some pics from Christmas Eve at our house!

My brother, his wife Sherry, and their daughter Shelby.

Cait after eating an oreo bonbon....her only one - she was a mess!

My handsome dude!

My niece Shelby - isn't she pretty??!!

My brother

My Mom and the gift Eli got from her at the Santa's workshop.

My Dad

Cait really enjoyed presents this year!

A moment that doesn't happen often - Delainey & Eli sitting next to each other and not fighting!

Delainey and her alphabet stamps from MawMaw & PawPaw

Let the Christmas posts begin!

My first Christmas picture post will be of our Christmas with Nana K and Grandpa Bill (Shawn's Mom and husband for those who aren't family). We usually do our Christmas celebration with them on Thanksgiving night but we changed it up a little this year!

I just think this picture is hilarious! Cait didn't want anyone but Mommy and Eli is attacking Bill. Kathy thought it was as funny as I did :)

One of Kathy's theme words is Hope. I "hope" she liked it - hardy har har har.

I got some Bath and Body Works!

Isn't this the cutest little vest for Cait??

She also got some blocks. She LOVES them!

Shawn got an IOU for Mario Kart! He is excited!!





Delainey got a shirt as pictured here. She also got a Digital Arts and Crafts Studio - it has been a really neat toy that keeps both her and Eli entertained!

Eli is into Ben 10 this year. I love Bill's face!

Cait got a baby.....she LOVES baby dolls!

Some more Ben 10 and a nice pic of Kathy.

We had a great weekend with them! We also went to Pioneer's Cabin - yummmm! Great family style meal and amazing desserts! They stayed over and went to church with us Sunday morning - which we always enjoy!

The promised pictures...

This picture is Caitney to a T!

This turned out to be a great picture of Shawn with his Mom and sister.

Some of you may recognize this picture from our Christmas card!

The world's cutest flower girl and ring bearer!

How many days until Christmas???

Anyone in a house full of 3 kids knows the answer to that - 10!!!!

We will be spending our Christmas at home this year. Apparently my Thanksgiving turkey was tasty enough for it to be requested for Christmas dinner! So I will be hosting that. We will also have Christmas Eve for my family at my house. On the 23rd, we are having Shawn's basketball team over for a Christmas party - that should be fun! It has been quite a while since we did that. I am responsible for cooking lasagna and then everyone else will bring the rest - sounds good to me!

The most recent kid news in our house is Cait's talking! She is SOOO funny. Her favorite thing to say now is "Stop that!" and most of the time it is "Bubby stop that!" hahahaha. And most of the time that is necessary. She has learned to say "more" when she wants more of something. Last night she even brought Eli's empty bowl over to us to have more of anything we would give her - funny girl!

The other two are getting very excited for presents and all. It seems that having the 3 gifts isn't going to be that disappointing afterall. They are so excited about their gold gift in particular! But they have fun imagining what their frankinsense and myrrh gifts will be too. It has definetly helped me not to overspend and is allowing us to be a little more financially free around the holidays.

The kids have their last day of school on the 22nd. Shawn still has to attend the 23rd but D&E don't. I will work on the 22nd, take vacation time on the 23rd and then am off until January 5th! Thank you State of Illinois for that wonderful paid time off!!.......or as they call it, holidays and administrative closure :)

Oh and I'm not sure if anyone reading would have children Delainey's age but, through the help of another blog, I found this great virtue filled website for little girls - www.preciousgirlsclub.com . From what I can tell it is sponsered by Precious Moments. D is having quite a bit of fun with it!

That is all from File land!

It's December!

It's hard to believe that it is already the last month of the year! I remember in the midst of Cait's 7 month long ear infections and other sickness at the time, Shawn and I were saying "Is it 2009 already???" Well, it almost is!

We spent the past weekend in Northern Illinois for Shawn's step-sister's wedding. Eli, Cait, my Mom and I went up Thursday by car. Delainey and Shawn came up Saturday by train. I would like to say that it was a nice relaxing weekend but that was not the case :( It was more like one of those rushed weekends and pretty stressful for yours truely. Delainey and Eli were the most adorable flower girl and ring bearer. Jamie was quite the beautiful bride and Eric was a very handsome groom. We did enjoy seeing our family and are happy for the new Mr & Mrs Wilborn!

I'm almost done Christmas shopping - yeah! There is still a whole lot of wrapping to do. I stole yet another idea from a blog and are putting fictious names on the gifts for the kids. The owners of the fictious names will be revealed Christmas morning....gotta keep them guessing! So, Comet, Donner, and Blitzen will be getting gold frankensense and myrrh presents!

Other good news - I wrote for a grant from the American Dental Association Foundation earlier this year and recieved news while we were up North that we were awarded $5000!!! I plan on developing age-appropriate pamphlets to be given to parents of children at pediatric well-checks and WIC visits. Then for the WIC offices and Medicaid pediatricians we will use the money to supply them with toothbrush kits for the children. I am able to use my boss' independent study student to do the majority of the research for me so all I will have to do design the pamplets, order the supplies and distribute all the materials. I'm super excited!

That is about it for the File's!