Little Mother

Emmie is such a little mother. She loves to take care of her dolls and she likes to have them do everything that Ellie does. It's pretty cute.

One day I had finished feeding Ellie and we were in the den playing and I looked over and Emmie had her doll in the highchair and was putting a bib on her and had gone and gotten a bowl and spoon for her doll. Since then she has done this at least once everyday. She takes good care of her baby doll!

Ellie has hanging out in the kitchen with the boppy behind her while I was cooking. Emmie went and got her dolls and a "boppy" for each of them and they all hung out together...Ellie loved it!

Also, Ellie did the cutest thing the other day and I'm hoping one day I can get it on video. Ellie was sitting beside me on the couch and Emmie walked over to the couch and started climbing up on it and Ellie smiled really big and leaned forward and reached for Emmie...it was precious and I love that they love each other so much!

Wrapped around her little finger...

When the ultrasound tech told us Emmie was a girl Paul's first words were "now I have to learn to braid hair and have tea parties!" (said in a voice full of panic).

Well he may not know how to braid hair yet (but I did teach him how to put Emmie's hair in a rubber band the other day) but he's learned how to play with sticker dolls (it's a cute book Emmie got for her birthday..think paper dolls but with stickers).

I'm pretty sure Emmie and Ellie have their Daddy well trained!

Gingerbread House

Last week while I was at work Emmie, Ellie, GG, and Papa made a gingerbread house! The pictures are so cute and I hear they had a lot of fun! Emmie told me it was "messy pretty".

Another day of Christmas!

We did Christmas with Paul's side of the family today. GG, Papa, Emily and Blake (aka Uncle Bake) came this afternoon after naptime and the kiddos were ready to open another round of presents. Franklin quickly found his presents so he got to open first.


Ellie has figured out the whole Christmas present thing...she's ready to open more!



Emmie checked out Uncle Blake's books...she flipped one and when she realized it didn't have any pictures she put it aside and picked up the next one and did the same thing...she did this for each book in the box. She decided her books were a lot better than Uncle Blake's!

Ellie modeling one of her new outfits. This outfit is so cute and she and Emmie got matching ones.

Ellie got 2 new Llama Llama books.

Emmie got Polar Express from Emily. She loves it and it has a CD inside of the book and I know we will enjoy listening to it in the car!

Emmie got Mousie books from GG and Papa. She was soo excited and it was 10 or 15 minutes before she was interested in opening any other presents...she had to read her books first!

Ellie modeling another outfit.

Uncle Blake give Emmie an Elmo and an Elmo book...she was super excited!

Christmas

We woke up this morning to discover that Santa had visited our house! Emmie was excited and went straight to Ellie's side of the toys...haha! I had to redirect her and she was very excited about her toys (and Ellie's).

The girls checked out all their toys from Santa and then we checked out our stockings. We all got lots of good stuff!

Ellie LOVED her new hat that was in her stocking!

We then fixed a big breakfast and ate breakfast while Ellie took a nap. After Ellie woke up (didn't take long since she never really went to sleep...too much excitement!) we opened up our presents. Franklin was super excited about his bag of presents as you can see.

Emmie got Elmo slippers but I think they scared her a little...she wouldn't put them on.

After all the present opening we just hung out around the house. It was so nice to have a day to just hang out as a family and not have anything to do or places to go!

We hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas (and as Emmie says we hope you have a Happy New!)!

Twas the Night Before Christmas

*sorry about the sideways pictures I've had recently...not sure what's up with blogger...it's happening to pictures that I didn't even take sideways so I really don't know what the issue is...consider it your neck exercise for the day..haha!*



The stockings were hung by the chimney with care.

 We had Christmas with my family today. We got some great gifts and my mom fixed us a delicious meal! The girls had a great time playing with everyone...they love having an audience!

Emmie and Grandaddy fixed a lovely cake.

Emmie loved her new lawn mower...she took it outside and cut a path to the swingset!

This afternoon we went to the candlelight service at church. We actually made it on time and I'm glad we did...it was packed! We had to stand through the first few hymns but then we were able to squeeze into a row. Fortunately we were beside people we knew! I love all the Christmas hymns and hate that we only get to sing them in December so one of my favorite things about the service was all the great songs we sang!
We came home from church and had dinner and then we got busy getting ready for Santa! Emmie, Ellie, Franklin and I wrote Santa a letter (I was the scribe) and then Emmie colored it while Ellie sat beside her and supervised and Franklin patrolled the premises...just in case Santa decided to come early. After the letter was finished, we set out some oreos (Emmie heard that Santa is currently on an oreo kick) and some carrots for the reindeer.

Emmie and I taste tested the oreos to make sure they were up to Santa's standards. Quality control is important.

After getting everything for Santa squared away the girls got baths and went to bed! We're also headed to bed soon so that Santa can come bring presents!
We hope you all have a wonderful Christmas!

Ellie's Baptisim

This past Sunday Ellie was baptised by Dr. Ferguson. Both of our families were here and after church we had lunch at our house. Ellie did well during the baptisim although she was really tired and she kept putting her hands behind her head like she does when she's tired...it was pretty funny!  Emmie was not happy about me holding her and so I put her down and she threw herself on the floor...luckily there was no screaming involved and Paul saved the day by giving her a pen so she could color on the bulletin she was holding! Once she got her pen she was well behaved through the rest of the baptisim.
I didn't have my camera and I haven't gotten the ones from my mom's camera yet so I have the ones Gin-g took but I might post some other ones next week!

Getting dressed....Ellie wore the dress that my mom made when Emmie was baptised. At some point I would love to get their monograms put on the inside of the dress.

My family...Ben (aka Uncle Bean or the Giant), Gran, Grandaddy, and Great-Grandmother

Paul's family...Emily (Blake's girlfriend), Blake (aka Uncle Bake), GG, PaPa, and Mammy

Ellie and my Grandmother

The Rachels. Paul's grandmother and his mom have Rachel for their first name and Ellie's middle name is Rachel.

Ellie received some baptisim gifts and some earlier 1/2 birthday gifts.

Emmie so kindly offered to help Ellie open her presents.