Black Friday

Nope, wasn't out fighting the crowds in an effort to save a few bucks.

I actually believe my comment on a friend's post on FB was, "Wild wolves couldn't drag me out in that madness."

 

Instead, we spent time doing a few things that have grown to become family  traditions.

 

Putting up the smaller Christmas Tree in the upstairs living room. 

(Wes has started to refer to this tree as the "Charlie Brown Tree" lol!  It's pretty small. We will put a larger, real tree in the basement in a couple weeks.) 

Tucker was beyond excited about decorating the tree.  As Daddy was putting up the lights he complained, "But it's taking Daddy FOREVER!  We're NEVER going to decorate it!"   He had to put each ornament in just the right spot and absolutely did not like for Gracie to disturb the ornaments.  (Of course, since decorating the tree, we have had to relocate all the ornaments to the top third of the tree to keep them out of Gracie's reach, so all Tucker's hard work and diligence was in vain :-/. )

 

Gracie was just fascinated by it all.  She, of course, wanted to be in on all the action.  She did her best to put decorations on the tree too.  She especially liked the ones with glitter.  Yeah, she's all girl ;). 

 

It makes my heart smile when I catch moments of Tucker and Gracie playing together.  They do it more and more now.  Unfortunately, this also means that they fight over toys more and more lol! 

Here they are playing with the Little People's Toy Nativity set together.  Gracie kept kissing baby Jesus and hugging him.  She understood right away that he was a "bay-bay". 

Tucker, on the other hand, is more interested in lining all the characters up and saying their names, then putting them back where they belong.

Another Black Friday tradition, and probably Daddy and Mommy's favorite, a family nap!

 Then more fun!  Old Chicago Pizza!

(Sorry, pic quality is bad....cell phone pics!)

Then, bowling!

 Gracie would get so excited about knocking the pins down that she had to give fist bumps every time lol!

Followed by breaking out in dance!

 Tucker was serious about it!  He wanted to know how many pins he got down each time.  He would watch his ball all the way down the lane.

He alternated between throwing the ball himself and using the guide. 

Excited to see the ball knocking down the pins!

The fun we had was definitely worth the extra money I may have saved by fighting crowds to get a good deal shopping.

I am so thankful for my little family and especially for all the memories we are making together :).