December with the Junkin's

Another hodge podge of pictures that I didn't want to make into separate blogs, but basically these are the buildup of things our family was doing prior to Christmas.  We went to Diane's "elopement" reception.  Everyone was making a strong point that this was an "elopement" and not a wedding reception.  I really have no idea what the difference is other than one is in front of fewer people.  But anyway, great to see Diane and Kathryn and how old they are now is crazy.  One married...other in college...makes me feel old, and for some reason in a manner not like my own siblings being in similar places.  Hmmm...I will have to explore that in future inner monologues.

Christopher Popinkins (Our Holiday Elf) was with us again this december, rolling the dining room, hiding all over, hanging from random places, and as always bringing smiles to little faces.  The air vents are always popular during the winter months for breakfast.  I think our family are all just Florida folks stuck in this Northern Region of Alabama...I don't know how we made it in Cullman so long...snow, wind, ice.

We had our first Carolers at the house.  A group of the teenagers from church came over and sang some songs from the lyrics on their iphones (my how times have changed).  Magan helped the kids make some cookies and decorate them.  I was able to take the boys to see the new Hobbit movie (Seriously, can we just end this movie!  It is very good, but I like an ending to a movie...LOTR first round including a supercool fight scene with Aragorn and the big UrukHai, then the Battle of Helms Deep finished the second movie, and the final [although very very long] ending to the series.  But NO, not with the hobbit, we will tease you with a dragon, then tease you with a flight, then make you wait 3 years for the ending we all know will happen)

And our last picture is all 4 kids getting their handprints on Magan's christmas gift.

A few stories for this Christmas season:
1.  Belle loves My little Ponies, but her cute way of talking about them is calling them "Hello Ponies", obviously confusing them with the popular Kitty.
2.  Belle is also ALWAYS singing in our car, and if not singing, talking.  (Note to Colby, the Belle doll will NOT stop singing, it just keeps going and going)  But anyway, her words are not really good to the songs as she apparently has my ear for the lyrics...Instead of "a dazzling place I never knew" in "A whole new World" from Alladin, we hear "a Jasmine place never new".  And Jingle Bells has become "Oh what fun it is to ride, jump and sleigh, HEY".  And from Spongebob, we heard several times "Sintas coming tonight tonight, Sintas coming tonight".
3.  Our friend from church, Jeanette Gerald, watches the kids for us sometimes and told us this story of Davis who had skinned his toe the previous day.  She saw him and asked him if he wanted a bandaid on it, and he said that their were only girly ones in the cabinet (He was right, we only had "Hello Pony" ones that day).  She told him he could wear one of those girly ones, nobody would know under his socks and shoes.  He looked at her seriously and said "Oh yes they would, my friend Tyler knows things like that, and he would find out".  She laughed and brought us two boxes of "Camo" manly bandaids to church the next Wednesday for Davis.