To Gran-Granny's house we go

After a big Saturday morning breakfast and some naps, we packed up the car and headed out again, this time east to Roseville where my Granny lives (Gran-Granny to the boys). Every Christmas Eve my parents, sister and I always met my aunt and uncle and two cousins out there to eat a yummy meal, open presents, and have some fun. Over the years, the family has grown, but the traditions are the same. Here's a look at Christmas Even at Gran-Granny's house:

I'm not sure how this plan got into action, but Kathy had requested Dad and Derek play some Christmas music to start the night off right, and so they did. Kathy held the hymnal, they played, and we all listened.

Not sure what these faces mean...

It was fun, and they sounded pretty good. Maybe next year Kathy can play the piano and bump it up to a trio. :)

This boy loves his aunt Bubba. He's drawn to her every time we get together. If I can't find him, I always know where to look.

Kennick greeted everyone when they came in the door. "Ho, Ho, Ho! Merry Christmas!"

Silly-ness

It's seriously impossible to get a perfect picture of these four. Three three year-olds and a 21 month-old ... it's a very much real-to-life picture.

B is the youngest, so he got to go first! Gran-Granny helped him open his present.

Cool! He seriously weed-eated all night long. It was hysterical! (and since then, our entire house has been trimmed, too)

Kennick got another ZuZhu pet. I'm not sure how I feel about these things. Baylen doesn't either. When it took off running and bouncing, I got the all-overs and B came running to my lap!

Neat-o! Kenle got some magnetic paper dress-up dolls. Why didn't they have these when I was little?!

And Cash got a cool car transporter! All the kids ended up playing with this present, too.

B also got a toolbox and drill, which was a big hit!

My dad made Kenle a doll- baby bed just exactly like the one that Kathy had when she was little. He did a great job on it.

The boys also got a huge box of hunting and fishing figurines and animals. Uncle J.P. helped explain each part, and I think he played a bit with them, too. (Just a note: we had a hard time getting started with letter J is for Jesus last week because when I taught Cash his letters when he was real little, I told him that J was for J.P. So he put up a fight when I told him that J was going to be for Jesus....)

B helped Gran-Granny open her presents, too. I think she loved the helping hand.

She received a gift card tree from mom and Kathy. It had lots of gift cards hanging from it from all her favorite places.

Here's Kathy showing off her new red reading glasses and animal crackers! (The adults usually get silly gifts, not pricey serious ones.)

The kiddos also got cool microphones in their stockings. They sang Jesus Loves Me and Away in a Manger to us while we were cleaning up.

Here's Gran-Granny and the great-grandbabies. I really wanted to get a picture of her and the grandkids with the great-grandbabies, but didn't think about it until we had left. Oh, well, maybe next time.

What a sweet time with family! It was a fun, full-of-laughs way to spend another Christmas Eve.

There were smiles all around.

And my little guy finally started warming up to my cousin, Jeremiah, which made him and me very happy. I so love my family, and am so thankful that we all still get together.

A Doggett family Christmas

Friday, Dec 23rd, we packed the car full of presents and drove south to Mt. Juliet, Tennessee, where Heath's older sister, Stacy, lives. She had agreed to host the family for Christmas this year, and we were excited to make the trip. We hadn't been to their house since December of 2008! She and her husband, Nathan, have a beautiful house with two lovable labs. The black lab, Cheyenne, used to be Heath's when he was in college, so Heath always enjoys seeing him, too.

Looks like Aunt Stacy has lots of fun things to play on at her house! The boys loved playing on her exercise equipment, and Cash was pretty good at the eliptical.

B found his seat early. Stacy and I got tickled at how he just sat right up on top of the armrest and put his sippie in the cupholder. Funny!

Here's PawPaw with his three grandboys. Too bad his eyes are closed ... they weren't sitting still for long though. They loved playing with each other, and they were very excited to start opening presents.

B stuck around in PawPaw's lap for an extra squeeze before getting down to open the first presents.

These presents were from Aunt Ali. Cash loved the Cars wrapping paper, and they both loved their presents!

See B's face? PawPaw was trying his hardest to get the toy car out of the package. It was impossible! You had to unscrew eight different screws! B couldn't stand the excitement!

It was a whirlwind! Heath and I were busy trying to get cars and bobcats out of the packaging, and by the time we got to our presents, everyone was done and playing or snacking on the dip or salsa! Heath was very excited, though, about his new grunt call and camera mount and lock. 

Marlo and the three kids, Ali, Stacy and Heath.

B actually got the bobcat, but it quickly became Cash's new favorite toy. He was going around Stacy's scooping up everything!

Nick was puling up his sweatpants, so Cash wanted to pull up his pants, too. I love seeing Cash watch and interact with Nick. He's so used to being the big cousin around Kennick and Kenle, but when's around Nick, he's the little cousin, and follows more than leads.

Here's Bo. Their labs are so calm and well-tempered. The boys were taken back at first because of their size (around 100 lbs. each), but they are extremely sweet dogs.

B was getting sleepy and found one of the dog beds to lie on. Great!

At first, B wouldn't go near the dogs, but by the end of the night, he was "massaging" Cheyenne's head with a tire off his new truck. Cheyenne didn't seem to mind.

Interesting picture -- here's Heath's (former) dog from his college days with his two little guys. My, how times change!

Christmas cookies, a new tradition?

A week before Christmas, Cash saw something on a TV show about baking homemade Christmas cookies with cookie cutters. I'm not positive, but I think it might have been a Special Agent Oso episode. He was very interested in cookie cutters and asked me if we could make some cookies "with dos things." So on the next trip to Wal-Mart, I found a set of three kid-friendly cookie cutters (a star, a gingerbread man, and a tree) and some Christmas-y sprinkles. I had all the stuff to make the cookies and icing at home, so we were set for some fun!

We started early one morning, because I knew it would be a process, and with a messy kitchen, two sinks full of dishes, one dumped out sprinkle container, some really green icing, two dirty covered-in-flour boys and only one meltdown later, we had close-enough-to-perfect Christmas cookies.

Yes, both boys helped with the entire process. I sat them both on the island in the kitchen and put them to work. Cash mixed up the dry ingredients for me. Note the tongue -- that means concentration.

Then we worked on the wet ingredients. Cash worked the mixer while B handed me the different things to measure and put in. He's not a huge fan of the mixer.

Then we rolled out the dough...

and started cutting the cookies. They weren't really the greatest at trying to get as many cookies as possible out the of dough at a time. I had to roll it out lots of times. Oh, well. 

Yes, those are fingerprints. 

He was having a blast, and he was getting really good at "cutting, wiggling, and digging the cookie out."

After B saw how much fun the rolling pin was, that was his biggest interest, and yes, he's covered in flour, too, even on his face. Notice the sock-foot on the rolling pin. Good thing we kept most of these cookies for ourselves!

Here they are fresh out of the oven! They looked awesome! I was pretty impressed with our work, and with the mess the kitchen was in...

Two naps and a wardrobe change later (not sure why he wanted to wear his pirate costume, but he insisted), we made green icing (that was super green because I let both boys squirt some of the food coloring) and then added the sprinkles on top.

This part just about did me in. At one point, it was all going well, and the next thing I knew, B had dumped the entire sprinkle container out onto the cookie sheet. Good thing I had the cookie sheet there to catch all of them!

B had a meltdown because I had to set him down to clean up the sprinkles, but he soon recovered (as did I) and we continued with our cookie decorating.

They were beautiful (especially in Cash's eyes). Most had just the right amount of sprinkles.

Some, however, had a bunch of sprinkles. (They were Cash's favorites. "So pretty, mommy!")

We all thought they were delicious. It was a fun day of cookie-making with my boys, an event that we may have to turn into a tradition!