Merry Christmas

 

 (Santa may have scared River juuuust a lil' bit) 

Merry Christmas! Love, 

The Ackleys

PS: For those who may not read our cousin Mary's blog, Grasshopper Momma, please continue to pray for her and her sweet .. sweet family! It was a bittersweet blessing that we were able to be there to celebrate Seans life with them over the holidays! I know your prayers mean the world to her now more than ever. And Im looking forward to seeing God continue to provide strength, peace, comfort, and hope through all of this.

oh christmas tree ...

Rivers favorite thing about Christmas so far = the tree.

This year we put the tree up even earlier. My goal was to let River get his fascination with the tree out of the way before we put the ornaments on it. And somehow that idea didnt backfire and actually kind of worked. He really does well just pointing at the ornaments now and not trying to rip them off the tree.

At other people's house he just runs up and says "oh my" "whats this?" and points at all the ornaments. He even tried hugging my moms ornaments on her tree.

He had a blast when we pulled our Christmas tree out. And I had even more fun watching him. Maybe one day he'll get to experience the joy of a real tree but for now he is pretty smitten with even this one:















after we finished "filling out" the tree he spent the rest of the night crawling under it and playing:




and then driving his cars through it:


pretty stinkin cute. We randomly find cars on the tree still. That boy is adorable.

Thanksgiving 2011

Thanksgiving this year was extra special. Not only because it was the same day we found out we were pregnant with Wylder last year or because we were able to celebrate with 2 kids at the table with us this year! (Especially this cute little turkey)

But also because our dear friends David & Crystal were also in town to celebrate with us! Yes, they do love us way too much!

and on top of that our house had 19 people in it for the Thanksgiving Dinner!

Id say the fact that we had a full house, a huge turkey, lots of wonderful conversation and community, kids running around, and full tummies was more than a blessing.

We woke up Thanksgiving morning to our annual monkey bread and Macy's Thanksgiving Parade.



however, I burned the monkey bread! Who does that? How is that even possible!? Its monkey bread!

Then we hung out in our PJ's and watched the parade. River loved it a lot more this year




trying to find elmo!

Note: He also LOVED the rockette dancers. like wouldnt take his eyes off the TV! How funny!





after being lazy all morning we finally set the table and finished trying to figure out how we were going to seat 19 people:



I think we officially had 17 chairs at the table. The other 2 kids sat in laps





of course since David was here we did our annual awkward poses:



(more akward pictures to come later!)



Then this stud muffin woke up from his nap. Made a few phone calls on skype to family. Then played while we waited for friends to arrive and put the finishing touches on the turkey










Freeland was heart broken that we couldnt find a 28 pound turkey this year. So we stuck to the 22 pound one .. it was the largest we could find. And he once again did an amazing job cooking it!



boys in the kitchen. girls in the living room. i like that!


all the guys trying to figure out how to make gravy. They were a little testy when I tried to help so I just let them do it.







Before dinner Freeland shared a few things about how grateful we were to have "family" up here to celebrate and eat with. And then David shared the original prayer that was said years ago on Thanksgiving. Afterwards, all our friends went around and said the 2 things they were most thankful for this year. It was a sweet time before we all dug into the food and stuffed our faces!



















I never got a picture of all the food. But I did get a picture of the desserts .. which are the main attraction anyway right?



Holy Yum! Pecan Pie, Chocolate Pecan Pie, Pumpkin Pecan Pie, Pumpkin Pie, Banana Pudding, Pumpkin Bread Pudding, Ginger Cookies and Apple Bread! CHELLO!



And of course, I never actually had one bite of turkey or ham. Of all days for River to refuse to sit in his high chair it had to be Thanksgiving with almost 20 people there to watch! So both our hands were full the entire time holding and switching kids. Then by the time we both put them to bed we were full from the side dishes and ready to move on to dessert. It was a hilarious.. but not at the same time .. but Im embracing it and I'll never forget it. (I may have been a little up tight for a few minutes but thankfully I got over it!)

Afterwards, those who could, stayed and watched football and hung out longer. I loved it. Even with the chaos of chasing kids & running around.. it was an amazing thanksgiving and Im so grateful for all the things we have to be thankful for.

now that we have snow on the ground

Okay, I just had to share these pictures of River in the leaves too before we get too far into winter.

(although the snow outside is already melting .. but whateves)

We have this beautiful tree outside our house (its our neighbors) and every fall the leaves turn bright yellow. I love that its what we wake up to in the morning looking outside our bedroom window.

Here it is 2 years ago in full force

And here are some pictures from this year:

































then he lost interest and became fasinated with the tree:







little tree hugger

PS: River is doing almost 100% better today. We had to put him on steroids but it almost immediately helped. He is now wired and completely hyped up which is a little humorous! Im so thankful he is doing better. Yesterday morning was pretty rough for him!