Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas everyone! Can you believe another Christmas has come and 2010 is just around the corner?!?! Christmas always seems like a milestone for our family as everything begins to slow down in late December. However, for most holiday seasons in the past, 'slow down' means running to this family and that and being out of our home for what seems like most of December. This year was different in that we're not traveling until the 31st of December, and even then, it will only be for a few days. We always enjoy spending time with family, but it's great to be home with the boys.

For Christmas this year, Santa gave Nate and I a little time to ourselves this morning, as both boys slept until past 7:00AM (although, somehow I still managed to get up at 5:30...)! Cooper has not slept until past 7:00 for many, many months. This was destined to be a very Merry Christmas indeed!!

This year we continued with Christmas 'light'! We've both been burdened to keep the gift quantity on the low side so there wasn't too much under the Bethell tree this morning! In fact, most of those gifts in the picture are for other family members (mostly Haraders, this year!) and the big one was for me. :)



Santa brought our family stockings, and then Nate hid them. This was a Bethell family tradition with Tom, Nate's dad, always doing the hiding (still does it to this day!), and it is a really fun tradition Nate is carrying on in our family. Cooper found his stocking with a little help. :)



After we opened stockings, we sang Happy Birthday to Jesus and blew out the candles on His birthday cake (just so happened to be a delicious Heath-bar / pecan coffee cake!). Cooper is really starting to ask questions about Santa and Jesus, so I think he was pretty confused that Jesus wasn't there to eat his cake. He said, "Mom - I think we should take a piece of cake to heaven for Jesus." Other Jesus questions - 'How far away is Jesus?' 'Why doesn't Jesus blow out his candles?' 'Only two candles? I thought Jesus was old?'




Cooper's gift from us this year was a new bike. He has asked for a bike from Rose's for a long time, and now he has it. :) And if you didn't notice, yes, it's yellow and green - John Deere green baby!




Miles gift from us was a Cars bouncy ball.



However, when the dust settled, both boys wanted to be inside the box of my gift. :)


Cooper's very favorite gift today was the new Cars underwear that Santa brought him in his stocking. We had to wash them right away so he could wear a pair.

Miles was a little jealous of his bro's new undies, so he decided to wear a pair of Coop's old undies over his pants.

What a day! We are thankful we understand the reason we celebrate this day! Happy Birthday, Jesus!

Bethell Family Christmas

The Bethells gathered at our house last weekend for A Bethell Family Christmas! Originally we were going to head to Branson on Saturday to spend the day at Silver Dollar City, but Saturday's high was somewhere around 17 degrees, so we decided to hunker down and enjoy some quality time at home.

We exchanged gifts on Friday night, and the best gift of all was the stuffing inside of one of the gifts. :)


We spent some quality time together over a puzzle:


Here is our very full table: (Miles is there, too, I promise. His high chair is off to the side of the table...)

Bethell Family Picture:

Sick

Cooper and Miles were both sick this week. Coop had a fever Monday through Wednesday, and Miles had it Wednesday and Thursday. Having sick kids is not easy - by Thursday I had reached my threshold in several areas. However, sick kids are most certainly love snuggles! Miles fell asleep on the couch a few times, and Cooper said, "Mom, I think it's time for my nap now," all three days of his fever. (Impressive for a kid who is nearing the end of the nap era!)

Getting dressed...

Cooper decided he wanted to wear all of his clean underwear on one day. The result:

Santa!

Cooper very willingly sat on Santa's lap this year! He had a nice conversation with him, although I missed most of it trying to convince Miles that Santa was a very nice guy and he should sit on his lap. :) This was the 3 seconds that Santa could hold on to Miles...

Meet Slash... (Cooper's stage name of course)

Air-guitar, underwear and 'life is a highway'. He's still working on the words to the verse, but is quite confident in his delivery of the chorus.