Christmas is Here...

Ahhhh...Christmas...it’s the MOST wonderful time of the year!  Fun family traditions, cooler weather, finding the perfect gifts for friends and family, Clarke the Elf visiting and potentially causing mayhem in our household. We all love Christmas!  And Christmas with little kids is WAY better than Christmas pre-kids. I love experiencing the magic of the season through their eyes. It really is so special. 

Mid-December, we spent the weekend in New Orleans seeing some of the Christmas lights, hotel decorations, and of course, eating beignets. It was a great weekend!  

We went to Winnsboro to celebrate with my side of the family on the Saturday before Christmas. Sue Sue along with Alicia and her family came by for a visit. We even had a special visit from Santa who was having some work done on his sleigh at the local airport.  

And then Mamaw, Lee and Kasie, and MiMi and Poppy came down for Christmas Eve/Christmas morning.  We made cookies, snacked, ate a delicious meal, watched a couple of movies...the usual. And then got up on Christmas morning to check out what Santa brought, opened presents, and ate a big pancake breakfast. Needless to say, everyone left just before lunchtime, and so the Rainwater Tribe just stayed in our pjs and lounged around all day. It was glorious!  

DS said afterwards that spending time with his family was his favorite part of Christmas. I think his Nintendo Switch was a VERY close second. But having him express that makes this Mama’s heart happy.  

We are looking forward to with grateful hearts to 2019 and whatever fun it will bring. 

Fall 2018...

We had a very fun (but super busy) fall. The boys played in a soccer league to enhance their skills and they had practice 2-3 days a week for about 3 months. A lot of the practices got cancelled due to weather, but between actually getting them there, and Maggie getting bored with us just walking around the fields, I was not sad when the season ended. 

Scotty and I took a long weekend trip to Austin for my birthday/our anniversary. We had a great time relaxing, eating, and spa-ing it up. It was much needed.  Shoutout to Gran for keeping the kids!

We had a few fall festivals and celebrations we attended. For Halloween, the kids had fun dressing up as Deadpool (DS), a skeleton (Drew), and an 80s workout girl (Maggie...obv...). 

Summer...

Once school let out for the boys, summer was upon us.  Gran and Papa mandated a stay-cation for the Anders crew so everybody came and stayed at our house for a long weekend. It was fun going to a few places around town we hadn’t yet enjoyed despite having lived in BR for over a decade. For most of the summer, DS and Drew got to attend a number of camps, have some fun play dates, swim (a lot), and they spent a week at Gran and Papa’s and MiMi and Poppy’s. It was jam-packed.  

One of our most fun weeks of the summer was spent at the beach. This year, it was Destin, and the Law Vacay group lived it up. 8 adults and 10 kids. The kids had a great time playing with each other, nightly slumber parties, snacking sessions, riding in the surf, and so much laughter. The adults had a great time too with much of the same activities (plus golf for the dads, and a Girl’s Night Out for the moms). It was a great trip to wind down our summer before school started back mid-August for the boys. 

Here are a few pics from our summer:

Despite the fun of the summer, we were ready to get back into a better routine for the school year. 

School Days...

In August, the boys went back to school (hallelujah!). David Scott started 3rd Grade and Drew began Kindergarten.

The transition to 3rd Grade was a little more difficult than I’d expected it to be. But we quickly figured it out and things have been great ever since. DS loves school and learning new things although he was disappointed that his best friend was not in the same class this year. 

For my little Drew Bug, the sweet child who smiles ALL the time, the move to K was a non-event. He also loves school and his teacher so that always makes things even better. Drew is learning to read this year and has made great improvements in his reading/phonics skills. I can’t wait to see how much more he progresses because he really seems to enjoy reading...until he gets frustrated and then he moves on to the next thing. 

And the little Mooster moved up at daycare to the Toddler class. She’s getting so big (not really; she’s still a little peanut), but her vocabulary is so great and she just talks and talks all the time.