Mama’s Holiday Wish List Meme

TodaysMama and GameStop are giving away a sleighful of gifts this holiday season and to enter I’m sharing this meme with you.

1. What is your holiday wish for your family?

I want lots of peace, good health, cheer, and happiness while my family celebrates the holidays together.

2. What is your Christmas morning tradition?

Our Christmas morning tradition consists of my husband and kids having a wonderful morning full of joy and excitement by opening presents from each other.

3. If you could ask Santa for one, completely decadent wish for yourself, what would it be?

A new house.

4. How do you make the holidays special without spending any money?

My family annually watches the movie "National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation", play board games, work on puzzles, and watch local Christmas lights displays.

5. What games did you play with your family growing up?

We played Ping-Pong, Monopoly, Pac-Man, and Space Invaders when I was younger.

6. What holiday tradition have you carried on from your own childhood?

I carry on the tradition of attending Mass on Christmas Eve every year.

7. Where would you go for a Christmas-away-from-home trip?

I would prefer to go to Hawaii or the Bahamas for a warm, sunny Christmas.

8. Check out GameStop and tell us, what are the three top items on your GameStop Wish List this year?

I would want a PlayStation 3, a Xbox 360, and assortment of games, wireless controllers, and memory cards for both consoles all for my kids.

(Note: My son Kyle helped out quite a bit on this post.)

Look Who is Crawling and The Sound of Music

Strange combination for a blog title but that is where we were this past weekend. Kaleb started crawling last weekend and by Tuesday had it mastered. He is a very active boy and getting into everything now. He had his first tooth come through this weekend also.Jessica performed in the school musical "The Sound of Music", over the weekend. This is a picture of her and one of her best friends, Troy. They have been in several plays and musicals together and play off of each other quite well. I have lots of other pictures and some video of the musical but it is late and I can't get it all posted. Jess played the part of Elsa Schraeder.
She did a wonderful job and has one more performance tomorrow night.

I am looking forward to Thanksgiving with family later this week.

Holly and Anthony

A few weeks ago I took some pictures of my niece, Holly and her fiance, Anthony.
They just recently got engaged. We found some beautiful spots to photograph. I have lots more to edit but just haven't got around to it. As you can see they are a great couple and were both so patient with me. Thanks guys, you are both so photogenic!

Kyle

Many people have been asking so I thought it was time to give an update on Kyle. He is doing great. Other than the hospitalization with pneumonia the day after Kaleb was born he has had done well this past year. He is a sophomore this year. He is busy with auto mechanics, FFA and this fall, football kept him busy every night. Although he has the OK to play sports and he loves sports, Kyle opted to be the manager again this year for the high school football team. It is a job that is actually a lot of work. He stayed after for practices like the rest of the team, goes to all of the games and worked on the stats after the game and on his own time. He loves keeping up with how the other local teams are doing also. Bedford ended their season last Friday night after making it to the Quarter finals. Kyle still gets to enjoy the Bearcats games that he frequently attends and watches football most every weekend.

Kyle also got his student driver's permit this fall, so he can drive back and forth to school and school events. It has sure made it nice for the baby and I.

We are quickly approaching the 2 year mark since Kyle's heart transplant. It is hard to believe how quickly time has gone and how much he has changed since then. If you look closely in the close up above you can see Kyle is wearing his "Donate Life" bracelet. He doesn't talk about his transplant much but wears his bracelet everyday. I am so proud of him. My once little boy is now turning into a young man!

He.

He is 5 months old today.
He is taking 61/2 ounces in his bottle about every 4 hours.
He sleeps through the night most of the time.
He is taking cereal twice a day and we started him on some
baby food. Last night he had squash and apples and liked it.
He still fits into a few 6 months but most of his clothes are
9 months now.
He wears size 3 shoes.
He can scoot himself around on his stomach.
He can get up on his hands and knees and rocks back and forth and is
occasionally able to move an arm forward.
He is a drooling machine.
He still spits up a lot.
He likes to watch Mickey Mouse Club House in the morning and recognizes the "Hot dog" song.
He likes the song "Wheels on the Bus".
He just started patting his right hand on his leg in repetition this past weekend.
He loves to sit at the table with his family and watch the big kids
interact and talk about what is going on at school.
He likes to watch the dog,"Toby" especially if he is chasing the cats.
He likes to rub his hands in Daddy's beard.
If he is awake he is constantly busy.
He is growing and changing daily and is a perfect fit in our busy family.

Happy Haloween From the Johnson's

Since yesterday was such a nice day we went outside and took some pictures of Kaleb in his Halloween costume. I told the kids and Kenton I thought it would be nice for us to dress up too. I don't want Kaleb to have to dress up and trick or treat alone on Halloween. I want it to be fun for him and think it would be more enjoyable for him if we all got into the spirit. Because of the impromptu of my decision we quickly rummaged through our closets and thanks to our "theater lover", Jessica, we came up with a few things. Hopefully next year we will have a better bunch of costumes. If you don't know what we are I will tell you: I was a football player, Kenton was a hunter (his idea), Kyle was Maverick from Top Gun, and Jess was Lloyd Dobler, from Say Anything. ( I have had to ask several times who that was!)

Kaleb's official First Halloween Photo. I do a little scrapbook for just Halloween. Each of the kids have one that has each Halloween's costume in it.

My sweet little cowboy and me!

Jessica in her Lloyd Dobler costume. Amazing how much fun we had in just a short 45 minutes!

We are off to trick or treat Gramma tonight. Happy Halloween!

My Joy

For the past two weeks Kaleb and I have enjoyed some beautiful fall weather. The older kids are usually busy after school so Kaleb and I have spent some time outside together when I get home from work. Today was cold and windy though so we had to stay in. Hopefully we will get a few more nice days to enjoy!