It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

at the Henry house!

Thanks to my mom I have a completed Willow Tree Nativity scene which I absolutely love! Trey and Grace love it too, so much that I had to move it to a higher location. Unfortunately one of the little lambs lost an ear when it was being chased by Mary, that's how the only witness (Trey) described the incident.

We've actually had a few cold nights lately which means hot drinks. Kenny likes a little whip cream on his coffee. He even takes a can to work and uses it during the day....only Kenny.

Santa Clause at our local Y. I just haven't had it in me to brave the mall Santa this year. Grace wouldn't go near this Santa, I can't imagine what she would do if she saw the mall Santa, probably crawl up the walls like a spider monkey to get away from him. She just doesn't care for strange men, which doesn't bother me one bit. Trey was a little timid at first but after he saw Kenny talking to him he walked over and hopped in his lap and asked him for an airplane.

Our 2nd year with a Christmas tree. I haven't tried to keep this one looking pretty. Trey and Grace love to redecorate it on a daily basis. I'll save the designer tree for their teenage years.

The stockings are hung, maybe one day Santa will bring me a mantle or even better a new fireplace like the one I saw in Southern Living.....something to think about Kenny, I mean Santa.

December is the one month of the year that I get the mail, Kenny takes on the other 11 months. I made that snowflake Christmas card holder at MOPS, I thought it turned out really cute.

Christmas sweaters, Christmas place mats, Christmas cheer, and apparently a lot of beverages for little Gracie.

The annual Christmas box from Andy. This box has every kind of candy you could imagine. We are always thankful for his thoughtfulness and generosity. Thank you again Andy!

Merry Christmas from Trey and Grace

Shout out to Big K

Kenny thank you! You have been such a big help always, but lately you have gone above and beyond. Over the past 2 nights you have helped clean up the kitchen, fished poop out of the bath tub (I still want to vomit over that one), listened to me go on and on about Christmas presents, re-hung the drapes, checked out the attic space situation, drove us around to look at Christmas lights, got out of the car in freezing cold weather with both kids to actually look at the lights on the trees (while I stayed in the car), you have put both kids to bed, you always offer to rub my feet at night, always offer to pick something up on the way home from work, and you do all this after working hard all day long. Thank you so much, you constantly tell me how blessed you feel, but I want you to know that you have always been and will ALWAYS be a blessing to me. Love you.

Thankful

Grace "helped" us decorate for Christmas once we got back from our Thanksgiving trip.

We spotted this crazy haired person in the woods. Oh wait, it's Kenny.

The classic Christmas picture with Kenny's parents. Why do kids stop smiling once it's time to take a Christmas picture?

There were tons of armadillos out this year. At one time Kenny, Grant, Beau and Trey were chasing them.

Just hanging out.

No description needed.

Trey fell asleep in Gaga's arms after a very long day of playing.

Beau and Trey

Grace reading a book, most likely trying to get away from the big kids.

The kids table. Kenny's mom found the cutest plates and silverware for them to eat off of. We no longer "rough it" when we go to the ranch. She has done an amazing job of transforming it over the past few years.

We went to Comfort, TX for Thanksgiving and had a great time with Kenny's family. His whole family plus extended family made it, which was fun for the adults and kids. Trey had a GREAT time playing with Beau and Brooke. His cousin Beau is 6 and sweet as can be. He played with Trey the whole time! I am missing a picture of everyone, but hopefully I can add it once it makes its way to my email.

In addition to enjoying Thanksgiving Kenny and I decided to head to the ranch a little early since he had a few days off. The car ride was....not fun. I don't know why. I think it was because we got a really late start and it took longer than expected. We hadn't mentally prepared for 8 hours in the car. For some reason I always think it takes 5 hours to get to the ranch. The day after we got there we headed to Natural Bridge Caverns. Many Texans may have seen the billboards from the highway, well we can now say we have been as a family. Kenny had been when he was little and had fond memories, I'm sure we canceled those out for him. It actually would have been fun if we had not had the chattiest tour guide ever. Trying to keep a 19 month old and 3 year old quiet while someone explains the history of a stalactite just doesn't work. However, Trey thought it was cool to climb and look at everything....just would have been better without the commentary.

The ride home was much better. Trey was doing awesome with potty training and we even had a miraculous moment on the car ride home where he asked to go to the bathroom and went at the gas station. However, we seem to be backtracking a little now that we are at home, ahhh life with a 3 year old. The first day back we dug out the Christmas decorations and got to work. It has been so much fun to see how excited both Trey and Grace get when they look at all of the

decorations and lights. They love to talk about Christmas and everything that it is about. Hope everyone is enjoying the season!

Blog Guilt

I don't know where all of my blogging time has gone. I was going to post our thanksgiving pictures, but can't find my camera....so another day. Maybe once Christmas is over I will get back into it. I got ambitious today while Trey and Grace were at preschool and started cleaning out our office. It is an even bigger disaster area now than it was a few hours ago. I am definitely kicking myself right about now for unleashing this beast. However, it should have been done about a year and a half ago when we moved in, but there were so many good excuses to not put everything in order. Now, it is just a mess and the garage and a few closets have become a mess so it is time to take control. My greatest fear is that someone will nominate me for a messy/cluttery house show. However, I wouldn't mind being nominated for What Not to Wear. I would gladly give up all of my clothes for a new wardrobe.

A few things Trey has said lately that I don't want to forget for his wedding rehearsal speech:

"I like this train park, it is part of my life"
"don't touch me, I'm special"
" when are all of the trees going to get Christmas on them"
when asked whether he wanted to wear a pull-up or big boy underwear "I want to wear a pull-up so that I can pee in it"

I can't leave Grace out. She is saying more words every day. Phew, for a while there we didn't know if she would ever decide to speak. Yesterday she learned the word no and said it about 100 times while we were in the car. I hope she got that out of her system. She also likes to say, apple, baby (she is in love with her baby dolls), mama, dada, Tay (trey), kitty, bandit, kay (okay), ball, cowboy, doggy, shoe, train....... She is amazing!

Hope everyone had a great thanksgiving. I'll post our pictures from the ranch soon.