Weekend before Christmas and Christmas Eve!

The week before Christmas, we ventured out of the house (with Caroline for the first time since she had been sick!) to go see Santa at Phipp's Plaza!  Park has been every year since his 2nd Christmas and they give you (well, you buy) an awesome video that I will cherish forever and ever!  Our sweet Santa is getting a little bit senile we noticed this year... we pray he's OK and can be Santa every year my kids want to go see Santa!  Ha!  Parker was super excited this year about Santa and couldn't wait to go see him!  His #1 thing on his list was "A helicopter with a Ka-mote control".  Earlier that month, he told us he wanted to ask Santa for a real helicopter that he could get in and fly up to the sky in.  Um... we told him Santa's elves didn't make those!  So, he settled for one with a "Ka-mote control" as he says it.  Ha!  He also asked for a dinosaur chomper (he found one in Cracker Barrel on Thanksgiving morning and loved it!) and he also asked for lots of puzzles.  He ended up getting everything he asked for so he must have been a really good little boy!  Parker was perfect for the picture with Santa and couldn't wait to sit on his lap!  To be honest, I was sort of hoping Caroline would cry in this picture.  You always see those pictures of babies screaming wanting to get away from Santa and I think those are so darn cute!  I sort of (purposefully) let Caroline skip her nap hoping she'd be a bit more irritable when we got there and would cry in his lap... that girl couldn't have been more content.  She didn't exactly smile, but she was definitley not sad!  Oh well... I guess there is always hope for baby #3 one day to be a crier!  Ha ha!  Oh - another funny story about this picture - well both my kids are wearing the SAME exactly outfits from last year!  WHOOPS!  They were both wearing outfits a little too big for them last year... and they were fitting much better this year. 

We, of course, went with the Markhams!  Who else would we go with since our kids have the same school schedule and our babies have the same napping schedule, the daddies both have flexible work schedules and the mommies both work part time from home with very flexible schedules... it just works out that we do practically everything together! 

A few days before Christmas Eve, Caroline came down with a really high fever again - around 102 - so we almost cancelled our plans to go to Savannah for Christmas.  My sister had JUST had a baby the week before so we were cautious about going in the first place since Caroline had been so, so sick a few weeks prior... but then when she got her high fever, we were just going to cancel it altogether.  Well, she woke up the next day with no fever and no symptoms, but it was the Saturday before Christmas and we really wanted a doctor to take a look at her before we made any definite plans.  So she and I headed to Children's Healthcare clinic just a few minutes from our house to make sure she was OK.  The main thing I was worried about was her O2 levels.  They were super low the last time she had gotten sick and I know that we may struggle with that anytime she gets sick from now on... well... wouldn't you know that O2 test came back at 100%!!!  Yay!  I was one happy mommy!  We got checked in and waited for about another hour and a half and we saw a doctor.  She did a strep test just to be sure (since we were going to be around such a little baby), but it was negative and she did have a ton of fluid build up in her ears, but it was not infected YET, so we were sent home with a clean bill of health and we got the OK to go to Savannah!  We left later that afternoon!  Here we are in the waiting room of the clinic... she was not thrilled about seeing doctors again!

This was after we had been waiting for an hour... there's not a ton for a baby to do in a waiting patient room!

Well we made it to Savannah just in time to have a fun date night!  We rushed to my parents, put Parker and Caroline in the bath and bathed them, then headed about 12 doors down to my sister's house so we could meet baby Ivy!

We only stayed a few minutes then rushed to Tybee Island for our dinner reservations!  Turns out my sister, Whitney, had made reservations for her and her husband the same night so we combined our reservations and went as a double date!  We never do that at home so it was a fun night out for all of us!

I got this picture of Caroline from my dad while we were at dinner... I was not surprised.  This girl LOVES climbing in and out of chairs!  She probably spends an hour a day in our little rocking chair in our den.

They next day was Sunday and we opted out of going to church because we were still not taking Caroline around any groups of people.  But after everyone got back from church, we headed to The Pirate's House with Whit and Doug and Kayley.  We left the babies at my parents to nap and had a fun time with the two big kids!  Park was LOVIN' all the pirate stuff! 

There was even a real pirate that would come by our table every so often and tell us stories from the sea!

And after we were done, she took us on a tour of the historic Pirate's House!  It was fun!

Granny come to visit on Sunday afternoon and stayed through the week with my parents.  She loved meeting her millionth great grand baby!  I lost count like after 10!

She was getting a little tired of my picture-taking!

Kayley loved holding baby Ivy!

So sweet.

Jac is a great big brother to Ivy!  I loved seeing him and spending time with him and his little brother, Miller over the holiday week! 

Nana holding baby Ivy

Me an KK being silly in the car over to Aunt Ashley's house!  We were all in between houses all week!  It was craziness.

That night, we had a VERY special visistor come to Aunt Ashley's house!!!!  Here are the kids waiting for their surprise!

 To help pass the time we let the kids sing all their fave Christmas carols!

AH!  THE DOORBELL RANG!  Rushing to the door to see who it is!

IT WAS SANTA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Park was the first one on his lap!

Helicopter with a kamote control, Santa.... got it?

Christmas Eve day began with pedicures for all the mommas!  Granny, the momma of us all, even joined in!  We also decided to get manicures... fun way to start Christmas Eve day!

I'm sure Whit loves that I posted this.  :)

Later that day, we headed to my parent's neighborhood dock with Parker!  The weather was awesome.  Here he is running to the water.

They have a huge swing so we swung together!  Our fave!

After we hung out at the dock, we rushed home to get ready for the Christmas Eve service at my parents church.  No one wanted to stay home with Caroline so we decided to take her and keep her in the service with us.  She did OK!  Here we are after church playing at Nana's house.

Ha!  Later that night, Whitney came over to see if we could find Kk's dog, Princess Ava.  Well, we thought she may be in the room Park was sleeping in so we went to look.  It was PITCH black  in his room and I leaned down to look under a chair and SMACK!  I hit my cheek HARD on the arm of a wooden chair!  I was worried I had a black eye for Christmas but thankfully it was just a little swollen. 

My sweet girl in her sweet Christmas nativity dress.  :)

Those eyes...

Bubba and his girlfriend, Ms. Sarah, came over for the evening too and we had fun seeing them.  Caroline loves her Bubba and she's warmed up nicely to Ms. Sarah, too!

Park was so excited to leave cookies and milk for Santa!

My first unsuccessful attempt at getting a pic of them together!

Better!  Merry Christmas Eve everyone!