Capturing our adventures one photo at a time...
Robert planned a fishing trip for the boys while we were down in Naples.
Everyone was hoping for a good catch like last time, but, it was just too cold for the fish! The boys tried…
and had some snacks…
but the only thing they caught that afternoon was some ice cream!
It’s never too cold for ice cream!
We all ended up back at the beach late that afternoon and it was just about perfect!
Doesn’t get much better than that!
Our Christmas day fun continued when our favorite people arrived!
Took no time to dive into the presents!
My favorite part of Christmas was giving Daddo the awesome book I made for him chronicling the history of his Ferrari collection…
Love Samantha giving Susu and GJ a baby doll show….
And out of all the super cool toys these guys got, I think these squishies were their favorite! Go figure!
The house was festive and the tables were set for a feast!
Robert, once again made the best tenderloin ever!
And I think everyone enjoyed some good cheer!
After lunch, there were lots more presents to be opened! The fun never stops!
Love these sweet cousins!
It was a great Christmas day with these cute kiddos!
Ho Ho Ho indeed! Only 11 months until we get to do it again!!
On Christmas Eve we went to the noon church service and everyone was looking holly jolly!
Especially Samantha in my old dress (that she also wore last year!)…
Samantha did “ok”…I’m hoping by next year we’ll all actually be able to enjoy the service! That afternoon I had some helpers while making food for Christmas day…
Best bowl cleaners around!
That night we had GJ, Daddo, and Susu over for dinner and Daddo gave the kids these neat Santa lanterns to put by their stockings so Santa could be sure to find them in the dark!
We then got on our Christmas pjs and got the cookies and milk ready!
The kids were excited!! (and here you either get Samantha picking her nose or Spencer’s eyes closed. Take your pick! ha!)
We did get a cute pic under our lanterns though!
Everyone then snuggled in with their special Christmas pillowcases…
and went fast asleep hoping that Santa would come!
Just a few more fun things we did leading up to Christmas…
I got to go up to Maxwell’s class to help them make a craft! I took pics of all the kids one day when I was at school one day and cut them out so they could “elf” themselves! These were my samples (which might hang on my fridge all year long!)…
It was fun to be up in the classroom with the kids and all of their elves turned out great!
I also went up to help with the Christmas party and they did a book exchange which was funny. I love seeing Maxwell in his element at school!
The boys got to go make gingerbread houses with James and his cousin, Rex. Maxwell has done this for a few years now but this was Spencer’s first time to get to to go!
Spencer also got invited to a Santa breakfast party the Saturday before Christmas – such fun!
These boys loved seeing Santa…and each other!
Samantha didn’t get invited to any special parties but, don’t worry, she fully enjoyed the spoils of the season too!
We loved having Susu in town before the holiday…
and got plenty of wear out of our Christmas pjs!
We were ready for Christmas!!
On Saturday we were feeling pretty proud of ourselves after our strong showing hiking Whiteside and decided to tackle Scaly Mountain with the Woods. It was marked as “moderate”, the same as Whiteside so we thought we would be fine. We got off to a strong start…
But, this path was much more of a wooded trail and had big steps, tricky parts, and slippery rocks. Samantha was just having trouble. So, we did what we had to do! This was my view for much of the hike…
and when I wasn’t looking at that, I was doing this! ha!
The boys had no trouble at all and kept running up ahead and finding cool things to check out!
Because this trail was so wooded, we were pretty protected from all the wind and, when you’re carrying a 40 lb medicine ball on your back and hiking up a hill, you get pretty hot! We were peeling out of our layers and trying to figure out ways to hold everything and hold Samantha!
It was a 2 mile hike up and 2 mile hike down the mountain. We probably carried her 3 of those 4 miles! But, that’s ok. As always, it was totally worth it when we got to the top!
Spencer and his new best bud, Shadow…
It took about an hour and a half to get up the mountain and about 30 minutes to get done. A great hike! Not 2 minutes after getting in the car, Samantha looked like this…
it’s exhausting being carried! 🙂
That night we watched a disappointing Iron Bowl. Oh well, Roll Tide anyway! There’s always next year! Sunday we packed up and headed back to Birmingham, but had to stop for a nutritious breakfast first!
What a wonderful trip!! Good family time (thanks for everything Lulu and Granddaddy!), excellent food, and plenty of fresh air and adventure! I think we all felt about like Samantha on the drive home…
Thankful for a great Thanksgiving!