Celebrating Thanksgiving and Decking the Halls

I stole the title from Jenny (thanks for the good idea, Jenny). Anyway, we had a good Thanksgiving. We hosted some extended family that lives in Texas. Thanks for driving to join us, Texas Jensens--it was fun to have you. Unfortunately, I didn't get any pictures since I spent most of my time in the kitchen and the few times I thought about grabbing the camera, I had to prevent Joey from doing something mischevious. The tables weren't very fancy and we used paper plates, but the food was good.

We were going to start our Christmas decorating on Friday, but since Jake was up most of Thanksgiving night, I took him to urgent care and my mommy diagnosis was right--ear infection. So, just as Joey is getting over his course of antibiotics, Jake is starting his.

On Saturday, we did get the decorations out and the boys had a great time helping Daddy put up the outside decorations.

J.D. and Jake also decided they would pretend to be Santa and his reindeer. Jake's costume is self explanatory, but J.D.'s needs some explanation. He told me that the pillow was his beard since it was white (well partly), but he needed to put the stick in his mouth to "hold it on." The ride-on toy he is sitting on is his sleigh. The imaginations and creativity of kids are great! Also, see the sidebar for the hilarious comments Jake made while we were getting the decorations out.

Our Christmas decorations have had to be modified some from last year. We haven't put the tree or the stockings up yet. I am dreading the amount of work it will be to prevent Joey from destroying the tree or even tipping it over. I bought some plastic ornaments (that look like glass) to put on the bottom of the tree, but even as we were paying for them in the store, Joey took one out of the box and ripped the small (swallow size) top part off with his teeth. I will now be supergluing those on before putting the ornaments on the tree. I need to find Joey a job as a childproofing tester because the other day he stood next to me and opened the childproof bottle of Infant Motrin (luckily, it was almost empty and I stopped him before he did anything with it). I also have to find a new place for the stockings because the stocking holders I have for the fireplace mantle will easily be pulled right down by Joey and are heavy and would probably land on his head. And did I mention that he has now figured out how to get past all of the childproofing and into the bathrooms. (But we love you, Joey!!!) One of his favorite new things to do is pose for the camera. He scrunches his face up and says, "Cheese." It is pretty cute. How can you get mad at this face? (Well, you can, but you get over it quickly.)