Willie Returns

While we were in WV all the little kids kept telling Jack and Kaleb how their elves were coming back and Jack kept asking "Mom, when will our elf arrive?" So the Monday after we got home Willie arrived :)

This year we made our first gingerbread train! 

 While I was in WV this fall I found this table and fell in love with it but the one in the store was raw wood so I had them order me one in black and we picked it up when we were there for Thanksgiving. I love it!!! 

 I love that he loves to read out of the Christmas book mom always read to Gino and me out of.

Jack's first Play

 The night we came home from WV was our ward Christmas party and I had gotten an email saying that Jack was going to be a goat. When I told him he was so excited. This is is first play :)

 

Then Santa showed up!!!

this was as close as Kaleb got lol

 The next day after church Kaleb laid and watched the train for a while. He really loves it! 

Gino goes to the Navy

On Oct 6 Gino left for the Great Lakes for bootcamp for the Navy.  I was shocked when he told me he joined because he is 29 but he was so excited. He told me he knew he wasn't going to go anywhere staying in Logan and he wanted to do something to make Ethan proud of him.  He graduated Dec 6 and mom was able to go up for graduation.  We are so proud of him :)

Back to West Virginia

Josh finally got some time off so we went back to WV for two weeks.  The first day we were home we went to Wal Mart and ran into an old friend of mine, John Goins, and I was telling him that Josh would like to hunt so he came and got him the next morning and showed him his land and let him hunt out of his tree stand.  Josh went hunting just about everyday we were home.  He didn't get anything this year but said he really enjoyed hunting in WV.  

My mom hasn't had her big Christmas tree up since 2004 so we decided, since she loves Christmas, that we were going to get it out and decorate it. Ethan was up there so we all did it together. 

 One of my greatest memories from my teenage years is going to Christmas in the Park Thanksgiving night.  I would always spend the day with family then a bunch of us Whitman Creekers would pile in a car and go. I love Christmas lights and always loved it so I was so excited to share this with my family. 

 Josh and Mello worked on mom's house some while we were there and of course the kids made trains out of the light switches :)

Christmas Decorating

We thought since we were going back to WV for Thanksgiving and not coming back until Dec 7 we would go on and decorate for Christmas.

 Kaleb loved helping put the ornaments on the tree but he kept hanging them all in one spot lol

 I had to wait till he went to bed to get them and distribute them all over

 Jack hanging the Santa Express ornament from last years trip to the North Pole

 Their favorite part, the Christmas train!!! Kaleb even got his engineer hat on :)

 It was Jack's turn to put the star on the tree

 Our first Christmas decorating on Apollo St.

 The boys even had their own little tree that they decorated 

 Beck and Kirby made this awesome train for the boys for Christmas

 Kelly made me these beautiful swags for my front door