Tis the Season 2010...Cousins

After a busy weekend of the Polar Express and the wedding, we all headed back to Papa and LeLe's house, including Kassidy and her boys. We had a great couple of days of cousin time with the four boys. Joel and Silas love their cousins SO much. It's really amazing how connected they are considering they live almost 2000 miles apart!

Rock-a-bye-baby

Sunday morning Papa and Aunt Kassidy took all of the boys on an adventure to the park.

Exploring in the trees

Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!

A little push from Papa

Swinging brothers

"S" is for Silly Silas

Sunday night we went up to FUMC Midland's One Night in Bethlehem. The boys had a great time. They got coins to trade for food, beads, painted rocks and other assorted items at the market. We also got to see sheep and shepherds, the angels, Mary, Joseph and baby Jesus, and even some of the Roman soldiers.

Listening intently

Same. eyes. Same. ears.

Joel and his goody bag. Silas....eating.

Jaxon contemplating.

Petting the animals
Notice Silas' beads. He has become obsessed with as he calls them, "beans".

Bath time for the little bros

It was a busy weekend. We were all exhausted!

Story time with LeLe

Before the Kassidy and the boys left on Monday, we put together a gingerbread train. The icing was kind of an ordeal but the boys loved adding all the candy.

I love the two pictures above and the expressions they capture.

What do you think these two boys were up to?

Jaxon adding the finishing touch...or sneaking a treat :)

Mischievous Joel and the finished train!

Live Moore Life...a Wedding!

Our weekend in Lubbock concluded with the beautiful wedding of my cousin Shawna and her new husband, Shaughn. Before we get to the pictures though, I must share about the rehearsal dinner on Friday night.

We basically went straight from the Polar Express over to the rehearsal dinner across town. The Nunez family was so gracious to invite all of us and even had a kids' food table full of kid friendly food! So, we walk in, Joel looked quite adorable in his pearl snapped shirt (see pic in Thanksgiving post). I'm not sure if he thought he had a coat on or if he just wanted to make an entrance, but he ripped it off! And in one motion, tossed it back to my sister and took off through the room, shirtless! We finally caught up to him on the other side of the room and he was completely unfazed. Even after I got on to him, it was like he never fully understood what the big deal was. What a way to make an entrance!

So back to the wedding day....

Papa with the big little brothers

I love this picture of Papa, LeLe and Aunt Sarah with all of the boys.

Rylan, Papa, Silas, LeLe, Jaxon, Joel & Sarah

Blowing bubbles after the wedding....so handsome!

My dad and his siblings...

John, Judy, Jan, and Jim

Also for the record, I confirmed with Jan and Judy and Silas is my little John. Aunt Jan said that the more she was around Silas, the more and more she thought he looked just like my dad. It was a great day of celebration and so much fun to see so many cousins that I haven't seen in years. Congrats Shaughn and Shawna! Thanks for including us in such a special day!

Tis the Season 2010....The Polar Express

The day after we flew to Midland, we headed north to Lubbock to ride the Polar Express. Kassidy, Jaxon and Rylan joined Papa, LeLe and crazy Aunt Sarah for an exciting ride! We went on the ride last year and Joel loved it so I knew it would be a big hit with the boys.

Joel was a little serious and Jaxon is all smiles.

I'm learning that Joel tends to take new experiences very serious until he gets comfortable.

Happy boys with their pretty momma!

My little cuties!

So handsome!

Jaxon and Aunt Leah Beth

Sarah, Kassidy and Rylan sat on the first row.
Joel, Jaxon and I sat behind them.
Papa, LeLe and Silas sat behind us.
At least that's how we started....and then it was musical chairs.
What we didn't get a picture of was Silas climbing back and forth between the seats. Instead of going over head first or one leg at a time or even just walking around the aisle, he would lean down in the seat, put his hands down, get into some kind of handstand and then push himself over the seat into the next.

I'm sure that Joel was telling the conductor a very interesting and obviously entertaining story while he punched the tickets.

And then the chefs brought our cookies and hot chocolate. And let's talk about the hot chocolate. Joel was obsessed. At one point his got spilled and he went into a complete pout. Thank goodness my mom knew one of the "chefs" and she graciously brought him a new one. He held onto it like it was gold.

There was lots of silliness.

And look at all that blonde!

And lots of checking out the view.
Joel was looking for wolves.
There are pictures of them in the book!

Silas and our friendly chef!

Soon we made it to the "North Pole", where we saw some elves dancing around and then Santa joined us for the ride back. The funniest part was when Santa boarded the train. He spoke to all the kids, handed out the bells and asked what they wanted for Christmas. Joel told him a motorcycle. What? Yep! That was his story and he stuck to it until Christmas morning. After Santa had moved on to the next group of kids, Joel told me he needed to talk to Santa. He walked over, tapped Santa's leg, pointed to aunt Sarah and said, "You forgot her." Of course, Santa obliged and returned to ask Sarah what she wanted for Christmas. Her request - a car. Unfortunately, that didn't fit in Santa's sleigh this year. Maybe for graduation? We didn't get a great shot of the boys with Santa. Joel was very serious when it came to Santa and Silas was hesitant. Overall, such a fun night of memories with the 4 fantastic fellas!

Tis the Season 2010...Christmas in California

The boys and I headed back to Texas pretty early in December so we celebrated an early Christmas at our house. Mostly for our own memories, here are a few pictures and a little commentary on our 5th! Christmas in California!

Our pretty tree!
Can I just point out the star on top? 
I got it at P0ttery Barn for next to nothing several years ago in an after-Christmas sale.
It's nothing special to anyone else, but I love it and it makes me smile every year.

Oh yes, back to our Christmas...We ended up opening our presents on Monday evening after David got off work, after David and I both struggled through a stomach bug the weekend we had it planned!

Joel opening his new drums

Silas in action
He kept saying, "Oh boy! Oh boy!" as each gift was opened. Too cute!

Joel loved his remote control car!

And Silas loved his fire truck!

The boys gave me a book and a shirt that Joel picked out.
I'd like to add that I had eyed the shirt at T@rget just a few days before. Good taste, that kid.

The boys picked out a flashlight/lantern for David.

They got swords. David talked me into it. And they love them, of course. We've had to establish some house rules. For instance, you must only sword fight with someone who has also has sword. And you must say, "On guard!" and wait for their reciprocating "On guard!" before your attack. Silas loves to run around yelling "On guard! On guard!" or "Fight! Fight! Fight!" Oh my!

Joel calls his sword a "gword-gighter" (rhymes with sword fighter)

As you can see in this picture, the boys got the long-requested P!llow Pets. In the weeks leading up to Christmas it was all Joel could talk about. At one point I asked him what he wanted for Christmas. He said, "A pillow pet!" No surprise there. "What else do you want?" I asked. "Uhhhhh....a pillow pet for Silas!" And so it was....Joel got a turtle and Silas, a bear.

Toys for the boys

I cooked "breakfast for dinner" which worked well since the boys' favorite meal is breakfast! The menu included omelets, bacon, homemade biscuits, homemade cinnamon rolls and fruit salad.

Our Christmas dinner

The boys loved drinking out of the Christmas cups!

Merry Christmas from the Moore boys!

Notice that Silas is already eating....typical :)

Live Moore Life...Thanksgiving

We (along with the Wrights) hosted Thanksgiving at our house this year. We were so sad to miss seeing all of our family in Texas and to miss seeing the Saints' win over the Cowboys live at Jerry-world! Thankfully we have an incredible group of friends, who we basically consider family, with whom we could celebrate! For dinner we hosted 15 adults and 7 kids, all 3 and under. Lots. of. people! On Wednesday night, Becca and I set the table. We went through several options...one long table, two or three separate tables, a T-shaped table and finally pushed 5 tables of varying sizes together in just the right way to create one giant table! It only took us about 2 hours to figure it all out. I think all those years of playing Tetris on the way to UT games paid off, Dad. It was big but so great. I loved having everyone in one big circle where you could see everyone and have great conversations. The food was amazing, of course, as everyone pitched in their special dishes. What a great night of giving thanks for all our blessings!

The feast and fellowship!

Our family*

*picture by KDR

The day after Thanksgiving was our church's annual Turkey Bowl. It's a flag football tournament and it's so much fun! Kim V graciously arranged for to have Kailey meet us there to watch the boys so both David and I could participate. I ended up being a co-captain for a team but David was stealthily chosen for a different team before we could pick him! And of course, our teams played each other in the first game. David's team won. The boys had a blast playing with Kailey and the entire Villa family. What a fun day!

Silas being silly with Kailey*

Touchdown!*

 Silas and Lizzy....worn out!*

Go deep! Go deep!*
*pictures from KVilla

On Saturday we thought it would be fun to take a family hike to some local waterfalls. We started out ok and the boys loved exploring everything....the rocks, the sticks, the rivers, etc. This specific trail had quite a few stream crossovers so David and I ended up carrying the boys a good portion of the way.

Hi-ho! Hi-ho! It's on a hike we go!

Leaves were a big hit on this particular day.

Peek-a-boo!

Are you coming?

Snacks are a must on the trail.

On the way back, we were crossing the stream again. David was carrying Joel and I had Silas. David's foot slipped and he fell into the water. He did a pretty amazing job of catching himself and keeping Joel mostly dry, but his leg took the brunt of the fall. Yikes! David got to the other side and I hurried to get across and check on them. In almost the same spot, I went crashing down too! Thankfully, I was didn't land on the same rock, and Silas and I were ok. Unfortunately, this was right after we left the falls so we still had most of the hike left to get back to the car!

When David and I both fell, we must have said to each other, "Are you ok? Are you ok?" because for the rest of the hike (most of which I was carrying Silas), anytime David or I slipped or lost our footing, even just slightly, Silas would say, "Ok? Ok, Mommy? Ok?" until I responded that yes, I was ok. It was really funny!

Evidence of the fall