It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year...

 

  

 

 

  

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Dear Santa, Thank you for my mommy...literally!

It's not every child who can say their Granddad is Santa Claus, *ahem* plays Santa Claus at the mall.  We certainly had a unique opportunity this weekend to get a personal encounter with the "Bearded Man" himself.  Here's our weekend in a few pictures:

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Birthday Blessings

I can't believe I'm 29 today, but if it is indeed true then I'm so thankful to be married to THE BEST husband and have THE MOST PRECIOUS child.

When your son sings along with you as you sing a song to him that you've sung since he was born, you feel truly blessed on your birthday.

When your son says "prayers Mommy" before you put him to bed you remember what really matters on your birthday.

I am so thankful.  Motherhood has already made my birthdays different but in a wonderful way.

God is so gracious to have given me another year of life and to be a blessed daughter, sister, wife, and mom.

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There's a first time for everything...

...but this may have been my first and last!

I am just not a baker.  Ugh.  I'm worn out from all the cookies I mixed, cut, and iced today.  I'm sure it's therapy for some but it just stresses me out for some reason.

Elijah has just loved all things pertaining to pumpkins and jack-o-lanterns, so I wanted to make some festive cookies!  So here are my pumpkin, apple, leaf, and acorn cookies.  (I realized too late that my pumpkin's face got smeared - whoops!)

We have an overabundance of iced sugar cookies at our house right now.  I gave some away, but not enough.  Good thing I'm not a huge fan because they are pretty yummy!

I am, however, excited about making some more Moravian cookies this Thanksgiving.  I think those are well worth the trouble!


In another note... Justin and I are off to Asheboro, NC to lead the music for a Secretary's conference for three days.  It will be weird, but we're leaving Elijah behind for the grandparents to spoil and we're spoiling ourself with some time away!

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Pumpkin Fun!

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We're Ready for the Cold Weather to Stay!!

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Pajama Week

I was looking at pictures I took this week and realized Elijah was in his pajamas for almost every one.  Maybe he just looks so cozy in his pj's I didn't change him until later in the day....I don't know!  But it's a recurring them in our recent photos.

 Our little recording artist

Watching TV with friends

 Making an interesting pumpkin face

Playing with some cool things Daddy borrowed from church for a project...we took advantage of them!

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Hangers, Hangers, Everywhere!

Elijah is completely obsessed with clothes hangers.  I'm not exactly sure why.  If he sees one, he has to have it.  And (being the little OCD child that he is) he usually likes to have two of the same color, and won't give up until they match.

I think this obsession is only fueled by the fact that he has been going with me to volunteer in the LifeLine Baby Boutique each Monday morning.  There are so many clothes, which equals so many hangers!  Not only are there so many hangers, but there are so many different colors of hangers to choose from!

There are great and different toys for him to play with while we are there, but nothing keeps him more occupied than the clothes hangers.  So strange!

We went shopping on Saturday for the first time since this obsession and he freaked out every time I picked up an item of clothing!

I really think we need to find him the "barrel of monkeys" toy, because he really likes linking them together and hanging them from one another.  (Perhaps this is how someone else invented the barrel of monkeys!)

Well my little monkey is stuck on hangers right now....wonder what the next obsession will be?!

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Day 3 at the Beach!

Finally...the day it didn't rain!  We actually felt the warmth of the sun and headed out on the beach before we packed up to come back home.  It turns out that Elijah is not a huge fan of the ocean at this point in his life, so it did not hurt our trip too much that it rained the majority of the time.  I think Elijah enjoyed the other activities we did a lot more than going out on the beach.  He did enjoy the waves for a little while in the safety of his Daddy's arms, so that was sweet to watch!

 Elijah was content to check out shells and stay as far away from the water as possible.

 But with a little help from Daddy he wasn't as scared.

 Elijah had fun checking out his shadow!

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Day 2 at the Beach

Wow...our beach trip is seeming so far away now, but here's the scoop on day #2 of our trip:

We hung out on the beach for a little while until it got just a little bit too windy.  Elijah didn't really want to have anything to do with the water, but he was content to play with the sand and stay near the sand dunes (as far away from the water as possible)!  In his defense, the waves were still pretty harsh from the weather we experienced the day before.  Here's a glimpse of the beach:

We headed to Fort Macon, which was about 4 miles from where we were staying.  We had never been there before and I don't know if it was just because I was in such a photographing mood or what, but it was one of the highlights of our trip!  Such a great place to learn and let Elijah roam around.  Here are some of the pictures we captured there:

Later that evening we went to check out the NC Seafood Festival, but there wasn't much going on there because it started raining again.  It was a fun day!

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