Well it seems I have gotten very far behind so this will be a long one! We have been very busy the last month or so but will try to quickly bring you up to speed in pictures.
The weekend after Thanksgiving we made a trip to Hallettsville for the Grahmann Thanksgiving gathering and of course we had to make a stop at the courthouse to Santa. Jillian wasn't too sure about Santa but was cool with Mrs. Clause. She made it through without crying!
We headed back to the courthouse in the evening to enjoy the lighting and Jillian enjoyed riding on daddy's shoulders and watching the lighted parade.
We actually got our tree up right after Thanksgiving this year and I didn't quite know how Jillian would react this year. She was very interested at first and she didn't want to help put the ornaments on. Now that she has gotten used to it, she likes to look at the ornaments on the tree and she just touches them and talks about them. She especially likes the cat ornaments, which she proudly says is "morris." She also now makes sure that we plug all the lights in, telling us, "more yights!"
Jillian's new favorite thing to do is walking in my heel heeled boots - it of course has to be these that are the hardest for her to walk in. I see play shoes in her immediate future!
St. Nicholas also visited us early in December and Jillian enjoyed opening her stocking. She got crayons, coloring books, and an ornament.
Oh coloring is also a new favorite past time.
Two weekends ago the whole family, including Bandit ventured to Dallas to visit my friend Tamara. Jillian made the trip ok but I do have to say Bandit did much better than her. While in Dallas I told Tamara that we wanted to do something fun for the holidays. We tried to go see a light exhibit on Saturday night but after waiting in the traffic for over an hour, Jillian had enough and we ended up having to leave just as we got to the exhibit! The next day we ventured to Grapevine to see the ice exhibit, which was awesome. While walking we saw this life-sized gingerbread house - it was cool as well.
The ice exhibit was The Charlie Brown Christmas and everything is made of ice! They keep the exhibit at about 11 degrees so it is quite cold! They give everyone long parkas to keep warm.
At the end they even had the entire Nativity Scene made of ice. The entire show was really awesome to see so we were glad that we did it! On our way home from Dallas, Jillian surprised us by not taking a nap at all. She entertained us the entire way with her TALKING! She is officially talking but is still very shy and won't really talk around anyone but us and at school. She will now pretty much repeat everything we tell her to and it is so much fun! My favorite of course, is when she says, "I love you, night night" when she is going to bed.
This past weekend James and I found time to go to his Christmas party. Thanks to Grandma and Papa for watching Jillian.
Saturday Jillian and I headed to Hallettsville for our first Christmas gathering! It was a long car ride considering Jillian cried pretty much the whole way. After a nap though she was a little better and enjoyed opening her present
and playing outside
Jillian appeared happy to be back at her house and enjoyed playing with her babies - I am also really excited that she is getting into babies!
It was a very eventful month so it was time for Daddy and Jillian to rest - My family is so cute and I am so grateful to have them!
After a quick breakfast and family picture pose, we opened all of our gifts.
Jillian got dishes and play food for her new...
Kitchen!
She also got a baby doll and some high-heeled shoes
Showing off her shoes
After a Christmas Eve lunch with just the 3 of us we headed to Hallettsville to start Christmas Day with the Henke family. Notice Bandit joined us for this family picture but he is kind of hiding.
We started the day with Mass in the metal building but Jillian had to play before everyone arrived. Needless to say she was not good at Mass because she was at Granny and Grandpa's house and wanted to play.
We left Hallettsville around 3:30 and headed back to Austin for Christmas with the Whited's. Here are all the Whited grandchildren and Christie of course.
We had a wonderful dinner and again opened gifts
Jillian got a little impatient while waiting for gifts and decided that I needed to take my boots off so that she could wear them. Here she is trying to pull them off. Needless to say she was not successful.
After the Whited Christmas it was back to Hallettsville again so that we could have Christmas with my family on Sunday. Since we did not go to church for Christmas Mass we had to pose for pictures before Mass on Sunday. Notice Jillian's baby has on the same dress as her
We had a wonderful lunch at mom and dad's and even Bandit got to have a big bone with ham on it. Granny and Grandpa must actually like him even though they say they don't!
Granny and Grandpa posed with all of their grandchildren
and Joshua read us a Christmas story.
Then it was on to presents!
Can you guess what Jillian's favorite thing to do was?
We should have known all those toys weren't needed - we just needed empty boxes to make her happy!
