it's beginning to look a lot like Christmas (December)

the first weekend of December the indoor decorations went up - it's always so exciting to decorate at Christmas time!  Zoey loved her little people nativity (so did Liam) and though not maybe overly impressed, the kids did think the Christmas tree was pretty cool!  speaking of the Christmas tree, this year I was lazy decided to do something different - and I put no traditional decorations on the tree!  that's right!!!  you read it here!  instead, I put only hand-made (by the kids) "ornaments" on it!  then, the kids added to that with lots of new decorations and ornaments!  I thought it was pretty neat and I think it really did make them feel like they had more part of the whole decorating thing!!!

anyway, a few days later we (and by we, I mean my dad) put up our outdoor decorations!  Liam was Grandaddy's "helper" and he really enjoyed that!  he also really liked our new decorations, particularly the penguin - because he is loving penguins these days!  (skip forward to January:  I must mention his stuffed penguin, Penguino!  how cute is that!  I love the names Liam gives his little stuff friends!  I should get a pic of all of them, there's: "Beary", "Elephanty", "Penguino" - and a few randoms, but you see how the naming process goes!  that kid is amazing!!!)  after it was all set up, the other kids got to see it!!!  (they were too busy to hang around while the work was being done)  Zoey liked it and had to give each animal a hug, adorable!  then later that night Jericho accompanied me while I got some "night shots" of our fun little set up ... and, the sky was too pretty to resist - so I took a pic of that too!