Anyway… Miss K LOVES these reindeers and insists that we take her picture with them.  Isn’t she too cute?  :-)

I have been so bad about taking pictures in the past couple of months.  :-(  MUST.DO.BETTER!!!

I am trying to make myself take the Daily December photo challenge, but I am NOT committing that I will do it.  I have started and fallen off the wagon every other year so I am just going to make an effort and see what happens.  So far I am 2/2 – go me!!! 

I have all but one of the Christmas trees decorated in the house.  Here are two of my 6 trees.  Keep in mind that 2 are smaller trees and 1 is a tabletop tree.  I will be sharing pictures of those soon. 

This is the tree that greets you at the front door.  This used to be in the living room in the old house, but the entry here just SCREAMS for it.  I am HOPING to pick up another tall one on sale after Christmas!  This tree is decorated in snowmen and white & blue ornaments!

This is the tree in our great room.  I LOVE it!  I need to get a picture of the whole room in the daylight so you can see how good it looks in there. 

This tree is all gold and silver ornaments.  My mom designed and decorated this one.  *LOVE it!*

Pictures of my favorite tree are yet to come.  It’s the family tree and it is soooo special to all of us.  We love pulling the ornaments out of the box every year and remembering all of the great memories that each ornament represents. 

This ornament just says it all!  Right now I am feeling very blessed and loved… what better feeling is there than that??

I hope everyone is getting in the Christmas spirit.  I am working on it!  :-)

- cat cage
- stuffed cat
- litter box
- Santa barbie
- american doll movie
- elf barbie
- polly pockets
- another bag for polly pockets
- barbie that looks like daddy
- barbie that looks like Grandma
- barbie that looks like Grandpa
- unicorn webkinz
- ornament with picture of grandparents on it
- clothes (especially shirt with elves and Mr & Mrs. Claus)
- a bag that says Starbucks
- mario party DS
- Dora Saves the Mermaids (DS)
- movie about a family making a snowman
- small purple christmas tree/
- picture of Santa and Mrs. Claus
- Pink laptop
- Santa buddies movie
- pink rocket
- pink skateboard
- hamster
- pretend cleaning stuff
- pink xbox 360
- pink ps3
- hot pink controllers for above game systems
- ball with Santa & Mrs. Claus on it
- computer
- monitor
- pink headphones
- pink blinds (x2 for room)
- speakers for TV & computer

She has always had a fascination with Santa AND Mrs. Claus.  Her list every year consists of things with their pictures on it.  I guess she is going to just keep asking until we come through.  ;-)  Anyway… I guess I had better start looking for some of this stuff. 

Cracks me up we need a litter box for a stuffed cat…

We took a break long enough to go eat our turkey dinner at Cracker Barrel.  This has actually kind of become a family tradition.  More years than not… either my parents or us are in the middle of a move, my dad is traveling, or something.  We end up not having time for the sit down dinner at one of our houses and wind up at a restaurant to celebrate Thanksgiving.  As long as I am with the people I am most thankful for… I don’t care where it takes place!

I am ashamed to say that I haven’t been taking many pics… but that is about to change… I PROMISE!  :-)

We met up with some new friends there and talked for a bit.  It was nice!  Then they went and stood in line to see Santa.  Noah had no interest in that and he wanted to go hear the choirs because one of his new friends was singing. 

While we were waiting on things to start… I made Noah snap a quick pic of Eric and I! 

Right after the show started, my mom arrived with Kendall. 

But she ended up more interested in the hot chocolate than the show…

I am so lucky to call my mom one of my best friends.  I enjoy spending time with her and am now blessed to live about 4 minutes away! 

It was COLD out there!!  I can tell you that I will be bundling up even more Friday night for the parade… where are those long underwear again??!!

We have to say that we are really like living in Collierville.  There are soooooooo many great things about this town.  It has all the fun little quaint things of a small town… yet has all the great restaurants/shopping, etc that you could want.  :-)

(All pics taken with my point and shoot camera!)

In honesty… Zoe probably saw a squirrel and Kendall is keeping her from committing suicide by jumping out the window after it!  ;-)  But I still love the picture! 

They loaded the truck on Friday (20th) while we were in Collierville closing on our new house! 

(Thanks to my mom for capturing this pic for me!)

After the closing, we ran over to the house real quick to meet the locksmith to change all the door locks.  Then it was time to head back to Jackson to pick up the kids at school.  It was so hard when I pulled into the lot and saw Logan with all his friends taking pics before he left.  I cried.  Noah kept telling me that they would be ok…  I knew they would but it didn’t make it any easier for me.  I knew how hard those first few days were going to be at their new school. 

Thankfully, Logan’s best friend came with us for the weekend which made the transition a little smoother for Logan.  I think it helped him to see that we are still close enough for his friends to come visit, etc too!  

The truck arrived on Monday and the unpacking began!  Our moving package included a full unpack but we had no idea where we wanted to put everything so we just told them we would do that ourselves.  I was so busy directing all the guys where to take furniture that I didn’t get to take any pics of the truck at the new place.  :-( 

Anyway… here we are almost a week later and we are just about all settled in.  It has been an EXHAUSTING week getting everything put away.  We have made a zillion trips to Home Depot, Target, etc to buy little things we find we need.  It is all coming together nicely though.  We have also purchased some great furniture pieces.  We bought new bar stools, new futon, new ottoman coffee table…  We still need to pick up a dining room set but that will have to wait until AFTER the holidays!  I am just glad that things are getting settled! 

More to come…

(Yes, she dresses herself.  I have no say anymore… )

We are VERY VERY busy preparing for our move!  I should be up organizing and cleaning… but I am exhausted!  We were in Memphis today doing the final inspection on the house.  Then to the doctor’s office… Noah has double ear infections.  Poor little guy!  I am just so glad that his doctor got him in! 

It is so hard to believe that in TWO days our entire house will be packed up and getting ready to head to Collierville.  These last couple weeks have FLOWN by… which I knew they would with all that we have going on!  Miss K is staying with my mom for a couple days so I can try to get the house all organized for the movers.  Everytime I get something organized – she drags everything all over the place… makes me nuts.

While at the new house today I was taking pics of everything so I could try and figure out where to have movers put furniture, etc.  This house is awesome because of all the storage areas and the wall space.  I can’t wait to hang pictures!  I am thinking I am going to do all large gallery mounts.  It will fit the style of the house well. 

More soon!  :-)

A recent trip to Hallmark got me thinking about decorating my tree this year.  Which reminded me that I needed to decide what ornaments we were going to get.  We always buy 5 new ornaments that represent special memories from that year. There are so many great ones to choose from.  These are ones that I definitely want this year…

1.  Charlie Brown Christmas Ornament – if you know me at all, you know that I am a NUT about Charlie Brown.  I have been since I was a kid.  I NEVER miss watching his holiday shows. 

2.  Wired For Fun ornament – this could represent both of my boys who ALWAYS have something electronic in their hands!!!

3.  Cousin Eddie’s RV from Christmas Vacation ornament – need I really say more about this one???  This is our FAVORITE holiday movie of all time.  We watch it EVERY SINGLE YEAR on Christmas Eve and sometimes Thanksgiving too (if we are with my family). 

4.  Spa-Lendid Friends ornament – I started collecting these a couple years ago and they are my FAVORITE!  I want this one because it TOTALLY represents me and Dawn and how much fun we have on our “girl” outings. 

5.  Kitchen Queen or  Snow Much Fun to Cook ornament– this reminds me of how much I LOVE doing holiday baking right now.  :-)  I can’t decide which one I like better…  I am partial to snowmen…

6.  Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer – it even plays the song!!!  We always laugh because this was Kendall’s favorite song and video since forever… and my mom used to always tease her about it. 

7.  Ralphie’s Pink Nightmare ornament – I just LOVE this scene in the Christmas Story movie!  Another annual tradition around our house!  My mom is actually doing a Christmas Story themed tree this year so I bought this for her and gave it to her a few weeks ago!  :-)

As you can see… so many GREAT ornaments this year!  Ok… now I am getting excited for Christmas!  ;-)  If we could just get closed on the new house and moved over so I could start decorating!!! 

I am thankful that he got such a great offer from a wonderful company… and that they offer a relocation package.  I just wish things were moving smoother than they are.  I think we got spoiled by a past relo we had.  I literally spend ALL DAY, EVERY DAY on the phone with someone relo related trying to get things organized and scheduled.  It is insane… especially when I have a ZILLION things I NEED to be doing here to get my house ready for the movers to come pack up. 

The new house is all ready for us.  We are just waiting for our closing date next week. YES, I said NEXT week!  Wow – time really is flying by!  I am ready to just get moved on over and settled in before the holidays.  It is hard on the kids leaving their friends and I think it just makes it harder the longer we wait and they have to dwell and dread the final day here.  I know that past the anger and tears – they WILL make new friends and learn to love it there as much as they do here. It is still hard to see them hurting though.  I have cried far more tears than they have…

The middle and high schools have an AMAZING football program.  They have been to the play-offs for 15 straight years!  :-)  I just hope Logan builds up his confidence enough to try out.  I know he will do GREAT there!  They also have drama clubs which are right up Noah’s alley.  He loves doing school plays!!  Their scholastic programs are among the top in the state too.  It is a good move!!

Back to the house… I know I said I was not going to share any pictures of the house before we moved in, but I am calling on you all to help me with some decorating advice.  When I first saw this room in the house, I was in LOVE… L-O-V-E!!! 

I thought about how this would have been my dream room when I was a paper scrapbooker.  I could just see the shelves filled with paper trays full of colored cardstock and drawer organizers…  BUT – I am not a paper scrapper anymore and this will be Kendall’s play room.  I do LOVE the shelves… but the room is plain and busy at the same time.  Any decorating ideas???  It is a very large room and as you can see… has plenty of shelves!  ;-)  I have scoured the net for pictures of any rooms remotely similiar and haven’t found any.  Any ideas??

Any ideas??  Anyone?