Wade Christmas

The week after Christmas, we stayed with my Mom and Dad and had Christmas all over again! We woke up Monday morning like it was Christmas again! This boy was definitely a fan...

His favorite gift from the morning from Nani and Pop!

Unk and Aunt Meg stayed with Mom and Dad the same week. It was a full house and so much fun spending so much extra time with our family!

Nani of course had her learning centers out for Gavin all over the house! It looks like Unk was having the most fun here. Look at the intensity...

We had Christmas with my Dad's side of the family after Christmas, as well. We are so blessed to have so much family to have to split up all our family gatherings over 2 weeks!
Our family (with Gavin being sweet and rubbing his sister's head)

My grandmother Jane with all of the grandkids and our families:

Jane with the great grandkids:

The Hughes clan

Jane really can't get enough of her little Henley Jane!

I love this picture of my Dad opening this present. Hedge trimmers...wrapped in a trash bag! :)

Ryan and I have a reputation of getting pretty fantastic and inappropriate gifts for my cousins, Wade and Reid. So Wade (left) wanted to open our gift first this year! Haha. This was actually a filler gift, but they liked it better than their real one! It's fart putty in a can, so when you stick your finger in, it makes a fart sound. It was HILARIOUS! We're already scheming to come up with a great present for next year...

I'm really shocked that I don't have more pictures from the week. I think we just had too much fun to stop and get the camera!

Henley smiling for her Pop:

Gavin snuggling with Nani and Aunt Meg:

The Great Grandmothers got to spend a lot of extra time with their great granddaughter:

Henley and her cousin Caroline:

It was such a fun 2 weeks away from home! Thanks for putting up with us for so long, families! Now it's back to the real world for us--and a quiet and clean house for the grandparents!

Hughes Christmas

So January 7 is a bit late to post about Christmas, but we've all been sick sick sick around here! If Christmas decorations are still up in our house, it's still technically the Christmas season, right!? :)

We spent the week before Christmas and Christmas Day with Ryan's family this year.

What's Gavin's favorite thing about staying at Gram and Papaw's (other than the tractor, of course)? Candy! He was attempting to climb on the box to get to it:

All week we had fun with family, but there are just too many pictures to post. I will try to post some on facebook, though.

Here's my favorite of us:

When we went to the mall to see Santa, Gavin got to ride on one of these things for the very first time. He loved it and danced the whole time!

And on to the main event...Christmas morning!!

Gavin giving his sister kisses (with banana on his lips, I'm sure) first thing when he came downstairs.

His proud reaction after we all said, "Aww how sweet!"

This boy became a pro at opening presents this year and wanted to help everybody!

My mom always gave us an ornament every year growing up, so now our tree is full of my memories. I love it! So I wanted to start the same tradition for my kids. Gavin got a John Deere tractor ornament. He flipped out and wanted to play with it of course!

We also got him a kid-size guitar that he LOVES. This is him singing and playing. He closes his eyes with intensity when he sings. It's hilarious. If you didn't see the video of him playing it, go here to see it.

Aunt Amanda declared it a "PJ Day" and it was so fun!

This boy loves his Dad:

Snuggling with Aunt Amanda:

After we played in the snow, we finally got cleaned up for the day and took some family pictures. We dressed Gavin in his overalls because Papaw got a new pair for Christmas!

And pictures of the kiddos by the tree. Henley is actually screaming her head off here, but let's pretend she's smiling since Gavin is smiling so big...

This boy truly does love his sister:

He still pats her belly and says, "Baby!"

Oh, Henley Jane, you are so precious!!

This picture CRACKS ME UP!

My brother called her "Henley Lou Who" from The Grinch with this hat on. She was a tired little gal from her first Christmas!

More pictures from my family to come!

White Christmas

We are finally home after spending 2 weeks in Chattanooga. It was such a fun time spending so much extra time with family!

Christmas morning, we woke up to this at Ryan's parents' house...

We couldn't believe we really had a real White Christmas! It got up to about 5 inches! We all stopped opening presents to go enjoy it!

Gavin changed his mind about the snow and decided he liked it when he could sled in it! And we didn't bundle him up a ton.

Papaw getting ready to take him sledding:

Dakota loved it when we went sledding because she would chase us the whole way:

If you blow these pictures up you'll see that this boy is grinning from ear to ear!

Still not wanting to go inside yet!

This video shows how hard is snowed all day!

We bundled Henley up to enjoy her first White Christmas, too. She wasn't too impressed:

We had to put her under the overhang because the snow was so wet and getting her face drenched!

I of course had to make Henley touch the snow. She was not a fan.

Papaw had the idea to take Gavin riding on the tractor in the snow, so there was no more sledding the rest of the day! Only tractor riding!

This is Christmas evening. It stopped snowing but there was still so much on the ground!

Who needs presents when you have a White Christmas!?

Gavin the Guitarist

I'm a bit overwhelmed with all the pictures we took at Christmas, so while I'm sorting through those, enjoy this video. We bought Gavin a kid-size real classical guitar for Christmas off Craigslist and he loves it. He had a lot of fun with Unk making up a song about my Mom's dog, Belle, using the microphone and all. Words can't describe my love for this little boy...