Santa Claus is coming to town!

Annual reading of Twas the Night Before Christmas Santa brought Olivia lots of fun things!!

Having a tea party with her new Rose Petal Cottage Set

Showing off her medical kit!

Disney Christmas Trip 2009

Things we enjoyed doing at Disney this year included.....

Playing with balloon flowers while trying to destroy the lobby at OKW

Eating at Olivia's restaurant... ya know she's the boss!

Seeing her "Emmy"
Riding Nemo

Taking a banana break with Emily and Morgan

Eating at Teppan Edo... AKA Japan!

Riding Spaceship Earth

Seeing IllumiNations at Epcot

Riding Small World

Riding Pooh

Riding Peter Pan

Playing with cousins

Eating Disney World lollipops (who knew they tasted so much better??) and wearing her Tinkiebell shirt.

Visiting Minnie & Mickey's houses

Riding the Safari at Animal Kingdom

Looking cute for dinner

Watching Holiday Wishes with Family

Fireworks

Seeing the castle iced over

Santa Claus (ok we didn't REALLY like him, but we did it)

Finding some characters that aren't real!

They are so much less scary.

Seeing the Osbourne lights at Hollywood Studios

We had a great trip!

Gingerbread House

December 15, 2009

The Big 6-0!

Sunday was my dad's 60th birthday so planned a big birthday lunch, which was kind of a surprise. It was funny because my mom was proctoring the ACT on Saturday morning and my dad sent her a text that said, "How is the test going?" Well she thought it was me texting her so she sends this list of things to do back such as bake a cake, get folding chairs, vacuum the first floor... etc. So he said he was not going to text her anymore during the ACT because she had replied with this big long list of to-do items! He didn't really question why all this needed to be done so when I walked in, he had the cake already baked and then I took over and finished the rest of the list. German Choc Cake

We did a "soup" kind of party with Potato, Taco, and Brunswick Stew :) along with various salad and sub sandwiches. It was soo yummy!

We had a great crowd and it ended up being such a fun day!!!!

He got some AWESOME shoes from Margaritaville... totally something Jimmy Buffett would wear! LOL I want some now!

Polar Express

Thursday night, we took Olivia on the Polar Express trip to the North Pole. She had a great time, and the big kids did too! We left from the Chattanooga Railroad Museum and they had storytellers and everyone dressed up in character. A man in a baking chef's uniform handed out Gingerbread cookies, and a lady in a long "Santa" looking dress told the story of the Polar Express (by memory! word for word!) Then we arrived at the North Pole and Santa boarded the train and handed out jingle bells from his very own sleigh. We also sang several Christmas carols and drank "hot chocolate" (which was really a Yahoo drink). Olivia really liked it! (well, except seeing Santa!)

Our friend Amanda went with us!We've been friends since 7th grade & O loves her :)

Olivia and her gingerbread cookie.

Here's Santa!!

We are at the North Pole!

Olivia seeing Santa. She did not like him!

North Pole!

Gramma told Santa she wanted a Lexus!

When he came back by, he asked if she would talk to him now and she told him, "NO!"

Snow Day!!

Saturday we woke up to a snow covered Chattanooga! It was wonderful! We bundled up immediately and went outside so O could experience the snow. She has never really played in it before. We walked up to my grandparents's house because we my sister and I were little & it snowed, we would always walk to their house and see them and write messages on their cars in the snow. My grandmother would always be wearing shorts when out in the snow, but I think she's finally figured out it's too cold! HAHA :) She is very hot natured.
Our Japanese Maple
She was a little unsure about the snow at first. & Bailey hates snow! ha!

& Ben of course is in shorts!

We eventually got too cold and wet & had to head indoors!

The snow was pretty much melted by 11 or so and Olivia's Nana came to pick her up for some "girl time". She took Olivia, Emily, & Aunt Lesleigh to Build A Bear, while Ben & I got to go on a lunch date.

After Ben & I ate at Biba's (YUM!!), we ran by Hobby Lobby to check out the 50% off Christmas stuff and found a cute little 3' tree that we thought would be perfect for O's room themed in pink and silver. We got the tree and all the ornaments and tree skirt for under $30! I thought it was a good deal!

When Nana brought Olivia back, she was asleep so I set up the tree and put it in her room so she would see it when she woke up. She was very surprised! I still have to get a star & I also want to find a big silver "bling" monogram ornament for the middle to kind of have a focus & put the feather ornaments around it.

After waking up for a minute, she showed me her Build a Bear which she named Sarah, and her pink outfits and hairbows. She picked the outfit because it looked like a Princess! Isn't that sweet?

Sarah Beara as O calls her.

What a wonderful snow day and I hope Olivia has many more like this to come!!!

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas...