On and on and on...

Life is still busy.

The kids are still growing.

I can't seem to keep up with anything.

Every day is drastically different and painfully the same.

But this is chaotic and super fun.

On and on and on…

We left the car seat in the car for the first time last week and let Shelby ride like a big girl.

Of course, it was crazy windy and super cold - so she made her way into the store like this...

(She's been chewing her lip a lot recently.)

(But JJ used to do the same thing.)

(Actually, JJ used to suck on his upper lip so hard, he'd pull his nose down and he'd look like Samantha from Bewitched casting a spell or something.)

Aaaaaaanyway - 

Shelby was a fan of getting to be a big girl and look all over at everyone.

I would hear people snickering, look over to her, and she'd just be smiling and flirting away.

Like this...

….and this.

(Sheesh, her hair was looking red in these pictures.)

We got our trees put up finally!

The toy room tree - which JJ decorated all by himself.

Necklaces from parades, glittery plastic ornaments, and candy canes :)

The family tree.

I cheated on this one.

I had to.

I didn't have any strings of white lights.

Well, I did, but only like 10 feet of them.

But what I did have was like 429 web lights.

So we wrapped a web around the tree and called it a day.

You can't even tell!

It's sparkling, so it looks like the tree is only half lit - but the blinking lights are hard to capture in a picture. Kevin said this is how we'll be doing all the trees from now on, super easy.

And like I mentioned, we've got about 429 web lights, both white and colored.

I've been known to go overboard, what can I say.

JJ's tiny tree in his bedroom.

His room always looks so dark once we take the tree down. But for a month a year, he's got a pretty awesome night light.

On Friday, JJ's school had "Santa's Kottage".

He got to go Christmas shopping, ya'll!

We got home and the presents went straight under his tree.

I have no idea what is in those packages. 

I do know what he got Kevin, he told me. 

And I can tell Shelby's is some kind of plush toy.

But 2 of them feel like turkey basters, so I have no idea what's going on there.

Saturday was a busy day.

Cleaning, printing songs out for the church's Christmas program, hanging outside lights, wedding shower, then back to the cleaning and printing. Before bed, we made footprints of the kids for a craft, too.

Sunday we had church, then a fellowship dinner afterwards. 

Once we were home, I was back to cleaning.

Then, turning those sweet little footprints into Christmas trees.

I need to find a stamp or some stencils to put the date or something on it.

Can't quite decide.

Today, after I picked JJ up from school, we had a pretty intense dance party on the way home.

I mean seriously, you can't NOT dance when this song comes on.

It's my current obsession.

Over the weekend, Kevin and I went down and got JJ's old toy box from the basement.

It's full of his baby toys.

It looks like we've already had Christmas.

For Shelby, at least.

While the kids played, I made Shelby a temporary stocking until Umi can stitch her a proper one.

Kevin took the kids for the evening so I could get the house put back in order after all the crafting and moving toys back and forth, to and from the basement.

(This music table was a gift we gave JJ for his first birthday.)

We've got a big week and an even bigger weekend ahead of us.

JJ's very first school Christmas program is Saturday.

He's been cast as a shepherd.

I can't say how thankful I am for St. Marks. 

JJ comes home every day telling me about Moses, Noah, how God takes care of Him.

Next week, they're having a big birthday party for Jesus.

God bless those sweet people and that wonderful school!