Christmas Memories

We had a wonderful Christmas. Having a child in our house last year made Christmas a little bit more fun, but Noah was still so young that he didn't really get into it much. I had ten times more fun this year with him being older. It was a blast! Almost like being a kid all over again. I mean, don't get me wrong, we were very busy leading up to the holidays, but I'm so thankful I had some extra time off and that somehow by God's grace I was able to stop and relish in the joy of doing things with Noah for the first time this year. So, in an effort to treasure these awesome memories, I'm going to write some of the highlights down here. This is by no means everything and in no particular order but some of the stuff that really stuck with me.



1. Making cupcakes and chocolate covered pretzels with Noah. I bought a new step ladder for him to stand on and he LOVED helping me cook. He put the cup cake liners in the pan and helped me dump ingredients into the bowl. Messier than usual, but I don't think I've ever had so much fun baking! After they were baked and frosted he helped put on sprinkles. He didn't yet get the concept of not touching the jar of sprinkles to the top of the cupcake, but we're working on that. Then he helped drop the pretzels into the chocolate for me and again helped sprinkle when I got them out. I love getting to do these new things with my big boy! It's so fun to see him get excited over helping me and it's just such a wonderful opportunity to do things together and teach him things in the process. Anytime we're in the kitchen working now he asks me if I'm "cookin' "!


2. Christmas Eve service. Noah was with us for the first part of worship, then went to the nursery, and then we got him for the last songs. During the last part of worship, Point of Grace has a tradition of giving out Christmas ornaments for each family. The lights are dimmed and we sing Silent Night (no candles though this year). All of Mike's family worshipped with us again this year. When they turned down the lights Noah was very insistent on making sure every family member knew it had gotten dark, especially Aunt Vanessa and cousin Lydia. I told him we needed to be quiet, so he was trying to say "Dark!" quietly but kept getting louder since no one would really aknowledge him. Later, after we'd gotten our ornament and had gone back to our seats I moved to the back row with him so he could be closer to the other cousins and didn't have to try to talk so loudly to get their attention. He then proceeded to make sure Lydia (who wasn't talking at the time) knew we were supposed to be quiet. He kept saying "Lydia, Shhh! Dark!" over and over, getting louder each time until she aknowledged him. Of course by this time he wasn't really being quiet about it. Thankfully it was toward the end of worship, was mostly drowned out by music and we were pretty much surrounded by family so I don't think we disturbed anyone. I just loved so much having him be a part of all that with us and even though he was a little disruptive, it was just the best part of the whole night!


3. Family. Noah knows his family and really got excited about being around his cousins this year. He pretty much doesn't talk about one without mentioning the others. Basically all three names run together--Isaaclydiajared is how he says it. He asks about them all the time. He also knows all the family dogs, which dogs belong to which family members and wants to know if we'll be seeing them too. I love that he love his family so much and really loves being around them. That is probably one of the most imporant things that I want to teach him to value in his life and I'm so glad that he's already laying that foundation now.

4. Santa. Noah can identify Santa. He doens't know anything about who he is or what his supposed signifigance is but he can pick him out. He was excited when we told him that we were going to see him at the mall. But not so excited when we actually went face to face with Santa. I was realistic and knew this would likely happen but I thought I could at least sit near Santa and hold Noah but he quickly went limp and wriggled away from me wanting nothing to do with Santa. One iced chocolate chip cookie later, leaving the mall as we passed Santa he was yelling "Bye Santa" and was all smiles.


5. Decorating our tree. We got to decorate our first "big" tree as a family this year (our other one was 4.5 ft, this one is 7 ft) and I loved decorating in our new home. Noah helped try to hang ornaments but mostly tried to play with them and thought they were balls. Luckily some of the new ones I got were plastic so we didn't break any (yet). He loves the tree and will randomly go over to it and point at the ornaments to show me.


6. Jingle bells. Noah only picked up on part of one Christmas song this year. He loves Jingle Bells. He asks us to sing it. He loves the "ha ha" part (in the begining if you start with "Dashing through the snow"...you get to the "Laughing all the way...Ha, Ha, Ha!") and likes to shout "Hey" and the appropriate times. Of course he didn't really pick up on this till the holidays were almost over so we sing it a little out of season, but hey-it's cute and it makes him happy.

7. Tools and big boy table. He got a tool bench and tool set from Grandma and Granddad and his own Noah sized table and chairs from G.G. Without prompting, the first day I got everything out and put it all together for him, he got out his tools and crawled under the table and started "fixing" it...laid down on his back on the floor and everything. It was the cutest thing and such a great use of his imagination. I'm not sure where he got the idea because I don't know that he's seen us do it but he really looked like such a little fix it man. The great thing is that I used to do the same thing at my Grandmother's house (G.G. to Noah) to her dining table when I was a little kid. I can't believe he's getting to be such a big boy and is getting into pretend play like this already!

8. His persistence. As I mentioned above when talking about Christmas Eve service, Noah often will not stop trying to get your attention until you aknowledge him. He'll keep saying the name of whoever he's trying to talk to and will say it louder and with more inflection until that person stops what they are doing and pay attention to him. He did it with just about every family member over the holidays. It's kind of funny, is very telling of his personality, and is also something we'll have to start working on...maybe at least getting him to say excuse me rather than just interrupting without end will be a good start!

9. Open Presents! We spent Christmas Eve night at our house, just the three of us. Noah woke up early Christmas morning...7ish and we did the usual watching of Sesame Street in our bed until Mike and I were awake enough to get up. Noah was totally into Sesame Street and there was no mention of presents or anything. Part of him still not being old enought to completely get it. He knew there were presents there but didn't click that today was the day we'd open them. After a little while I asked him if he was ready to get out of bed and go open his presents. One minute he was sitting there expressionless and into the TV, the next minute he was bouncing up and down on the bed yelling "Open presents, open presents!!". He definitely understood what that meant!


10. Looking for toys. After 3 separate family Christmases (Tiltons, our family, Whites) Noah had pretty much figured out that opening a present usually meant he would be getting a toy. We had dinner with my Aunt and Uncle a couple days after Christmas and (by my request) they didn't get him more toys but instead got him crayons, stickers, a coloring book, and some bath crayons. When Noah got to open the present he kept digging in the bag and asking for toys. I'm not sure that I like this, but it's interesting that he figured it out already. On a side note, once he got in the bathtub he LOVED the bath colors (that are just a gel in a plastic crayon) and insisted that we all come look at what he was squirting on the side of the bathtub.


11. Merry Christmas! He learned how to say Merry Christmas, but typically only said "Merry!" with lots of enthusiasm and forgot to say the Christmas part.


(I realize this is a late post...I've been trying to get pictures ready to post as well but am having issues. I'll get this posted for now and will add the way late pictures later).

New House!

Admittedly long overdue, here are the pics of our new house. Still lots of decorating to be done but at least you can get a feel for the overall layout.

Walking in from the front door. Immediately to the left is a short hallway with the guest room on the left, bath straight ahead and Noah's room to the right.

Guest room. Basically empty for now. Getting ready to add more furniture in the master so current furniture will be moved in here.

Noah's/Guest Bath.

Noah's room

Living room. Got all new furniture for the living room that we love-especially the slate tile coffee tables.

Still in the living room. The french doors on the left go into the office/playroom. I didn't take any pictures of this since it's still such a mess. Basically this room has desk and computer, bookshelves, futon, and serves as another play area for Noah (will have his new table and chairs, tool bench, etc that he's getting for Christmas). The arched doorway to the right goes into our master bedroom.

Dining/Kitchen/Living areas are all very open and connected to each other. Space is large but very functional for us and exactly what we were looking for. Still looking to replace the dining table. The door straight back leads to the back yard.

Kitchen. Has large wrap around bar.

Pantry/Laundry room (aka Mommy's dream space--it's huge!)

Master Bedroom. We've gotten a new bed. Have a new dresser we still need to put together. Looking for new nightstands and a few extras. It's getting there but still need work here.

Master, looking into master bath.

Master Bath. Has double vanity sink (does wonders for the marriage!), separate shower and garden tub, walk in closet and separate room for the toilet.

Overall, we're settled for day to day stuff and still looking to do some painting (in living/dining and our master bed/bath) and decorating. Once the painting is done I'll put stuff on the walls but I wanted to avoid hanging things only having to rehang them again a few months later after painting so I haven't done anything yet. We love the place and love all the extra space, especially in the living area. It's given Noah a lot more freedom to run around and saves me a lot of stress since I no longer have to constantly watch him around stairs. Come by and see it all for yourself next time you're in our area!!

Decorating and "Snow"

We had fun decorating our Christmas tree with Noah's help this year. He did try to put some stuff on the tree but I think just had more fun playing with all the different ornaments. He sure did look cute posing in front of the tree once we were all done.

We also had a potential snow day. On Friday there was a significant chance of snow and of course as is usual in Texas when there's a chance of snow the weather guys made a big deal of it. We were both off on that day and were looking forward to a snow day at home. I think we ended up with maybe 10 minutes of super sparse snow flurries. Not even enough to show up in these pictures. But we did bundle up and head outside to snap some pictures. Noah thought his mittens were really funny and just got a kick out of playing with his hands and running around.

Thanksgiving

We went to Angleton for Thanksgiving to be with the Tilton family. Since Mike's brother's family headed to Chicago for Thanksgiving this year, his Dad and sister joined us there too since it would otherwise be just the two of them on the White side. All of the "Tilton" (I put quotations since it's now Whites and Zimmermans too since my sister and I are both married now) bunch were there and Thomas's girlfriend Brittany came down to watch the TX-A&M game with us later in the day. This was the first Thankgiving that we've had in Angleton in a long time. In my lifetime I think there's only been a few other years that we haven't gone to my great Aunt Georgie's (Grandmother's sister) for Thanksgiving--either in Rockport or San Antonio depending on where they lived at the time. My Grandmother is getting too delicate to travel (she'll be 96 in February) so this year we did it at my parents' house. Aunt Georgie actually ended up joining us along with some of her grandchildren too. It made for a full house but was lots of fun.

This was also the first time our whole family has been together for the TX-A&M game in years. Between us and my sister, who is an Aggie, one of us has had tickets to the game pretty much every year for the last 10 or 12 years. It was a good game and we all behaved ourselves pretty well.

Noah had a blast playing with everyone. He's still the only little one in my family so he of course gets lots of attention. Unfortunately a stomach bug was passed around by some of us so that part wasn't too fun but we were all able to at least enjoy our yummy Thanksgiving dinner. And we are so very thankful for all our blessings...wonderful family and friends, jobs, a great church home and a new house that we love. Thanks to God for ALL that He has given us!!

Noah helping me make green bean casserole-I'm not sure why I have that look on my face, I was actually really enjoying his "help".

This probably looks familar if you've seen our Christmas card.
The whole Tilton bunch

Noah playing dominoes with the big boys.

Playing with Granddad. The lion says "ROAR!"