anticipation

so, all week we've been saying we're "getting our big tree on saturday". the anticipation has nearly killed the kids (especially joshua) and nearly killed me with the number of times they asked, "how many more days??"

today was FINALLY the day.

we started it off by visiting santa. we try to keep santa pretty minimal as a part of Christmas. but, he is fun and the kids love the idea. we normally go to the mall, stand in line for too long, pay too much money for 1 stinkin' picture and hate the whole thing. well, our HOA has Santa at the community center 1 mile from our house. we went, walked in, got a picture for FREE and were out in 15 minutes! AWESOME! almost makes ME love Santa ;-) got that checked off for another year...

joshua was pretty timid...but he warmed up by the end - as you can tell in the second picture.



we got our tree at Lowe's (very fancy, i know - it's what we've always done and we've always loved them!) Pat got the lights on, i got the ribbon on and we all put the ornaments on this evening before the kids went to bed.

how cute are Bailey's little hands waiting for an ornament??


love Joshua's tongue...

the finished product! pictures never do Christmas trees justice. we had to get a taller tree this year. we literally had to bring a ladder in from the garage to do the top with lights, ribbon, ornaments and, of course, the angel.