My Little Helpers

One of my favorite days of the year is getting the Christmas tree. Growing up, my family would drive to the mountains, to a tree farm and my dad would cut down a tree. It was so fun...getting bundled up in the car under blankets, singing Christmas carols, running amongst the aisles of all the trees, and finding the perfect one. Then we'd go home & decorate the tree all together with Christmas music playing in the background. There might have been some hot chocolate involved as well. Oh how I love hot chocolate (with extra marshmellows)!

Well, Greg & I have changed the tradition a little bit, since the sight of Greg sawing down a tree is just NOT my idea of fun (nor do I think does that sounds very safe). And, there aren't many tree farms nearby that have Frasier Firs (yes, I'm a Christmas tree snob). So, now, we just go to Lowes!! :) We get a 7-8 foot tree and Greg always lugs it home in "Rosie," with part of it sticking out the window, looking completely ridiculous. Then we decorate the tree together - well, I string the lights on and Greg just sits by b/c usually it involves multiple tries and lots of cussing. And we have my favorite Christmas music playing in the background of course. I love pulling out all the ornaments and reminiscing about what each one is from or means to me. (I know this might slightly annoy Greg, but it's a Gibbs tradition!) Luckily, Joyce gave me a few childhood ones of Greg's last year, so finally, he has some "memories" on the tree too!

This was the first year that Nate really wanted to help decorate the tree. And, lo & behold, my 3-yr-old started a new tradition himself! He insisted we all wear reindeer antlers or Santa hats while we were decorating. I loved it, and surprisingly, Greg did too! In fact, he wore the Santa hat almost all day!! :)



We decided to start another new tradition, and let the kids put the angel on the tree. This year was Nate's turn, obviously. He felt so important!!

And in order to keep him occupied while I was doing the lights, I gave him a project - organizing/sorting all of the ornaments. As you can see, he just transferred them from one pile to another. Great job, N.

He really did help though, and was super proud of his cluster of 600 ornaments right in front of the tree, which Mommy had to tweak just a little bit! At one point, he had to stop and take a break, b/c as he declared "This is hard work, Mommy!" Then 2 minutes later, I hear "Good job, Mommy!" Such a little cheerleader :)

Surprisingly, Abby wasn't too interested in the tree-decorating process. She has designated a few chosen ornaments on the bottom of the tree that she likes to munch on, but so far that is it.

Nate is VERY into all things Christmas this year, and it's so fun to see his excitement. I give the kids a Hallmark ornament each year (yet another tradition I stole from my Mom), and when Nate saw his Elmo one from 2008 and Mickey one from 2009, he was THRILLED. We also had fun looking back on the photo ornaments from each year. Hard to believe they were ever so little!! It definitely took 3x as long this year to decorate, but was 3x as fun!

Fatfest 2010

We traveled to Knoxville for Thanksgiving this year, b/c my little sister Becky & her new hubbie Mike graciously agreed to host. They had no clue what they were getting into! We arrived Wednesday around lunch, as well as my older sister Lora, our parents, and their dog Sophie. And Bec & Mike have a dog too. It was a full house!! Luckily, Bec has some of the most generous friends ever and they offered their 3 bedroom house to our family, since they'd be out of town for the week. SO nice! We were able to spread out with the kids, and give them each their own rooms. So that part of traveling that makes it so stressful was taken out of the equation, allowing us to have an even better time than usual! :)

Wednesday night we chowed down at a mexican place, and then went back to Bec's for cake & presents...we celebrated my 31st & my Dad's 61st bdays. Yes, we are getting old! Here are all the November birthdays! Me, Poppy, and Abby (and of course N had to crash the pic)

My family very generously gave me a new fancy ipod nano! My name is even engraved on it! Don't ask me how to use it yet though...I still have to read the manual.

Best buds - love them!

Nate got an early Xmas present - a nativity scene - or as he calls it: Playing Baby Jesus

Awesome pic of N with Aunt Lora!

Thursday (MY BDAY & THANKSGIVING!), we started off the day right by doing a 5K race. Poor Poppy was having foot issues, so he was relegated to photographer duty, while Aunt Lora & Nanny were happy to stay home with the kids.

Like any normal runners, we rewarded ourselves with hot fresh & now KRISPY KREME DOUGHNUTS afterwards! In fact, we were just ordering a dozen, and a man behind us in line gave us a coupon for another free dozen! So we had 26 doughnuts (b/c we got 2 mini ones for N). Yes you read that right, 26! Can you say best bday ever!?

Someone was anxiously awaiting his donuts at home...

Later in the day, we played around at Aunt Bebe's while everyone was hard at work cooking (except us)

Abby Reece rocked some gold ballet shoes for Thanksgiving! Could she be any cuter!?

Mom with her future fashionista

Nate was taking SUCH a long nap that we had to wake him up for Thanksgiving dinner. Or rather, Greg woke him up by putting Abby on N's bed..not a smart move. She smacked him in the face by accident and he was grumpy most of our meal. Poor Poppy even had to take him for a brief walk outside to cheer him up. Fun times! But man he looks cute when he's sleeping! We just should have left him...lesson learned.

The gracious hosts (and newlyweds)!


Friday, we decided to take it easy instead of heading out at 4 am for all the Black Friday deals like we usually do. Two early mornings were just not our idea of fun on vacation! (Plus, I'm almost done with my Christmas shopping anyway!!) So, we played around at the Pugh's (our house) some in the morning, before heading over to Aunt Bebe's for a huge breakfast. Abby LOVED the toys & little chair there!

Abby was chowing down at breakfast...yes, even on the plate. Girlfriend can eat!

Aunt Bebe with her girl

Nanny & Poppy volunteered to watch the grandkids while all of us "kids" headed to the movies at noon. Me, Greg, L, and Mike all saw the new "Harry Potter" at the IMAX theater. (Bec went to see "Morning Glory" instead.) A fun time was had by all. Even though HP wasn't in 3-D, Greg managed to get some 3-D glasses from the little old lady at the ticket counter. Abby enjoyed these once we got home!

Brother-in-laws bonding

Sisters bonding, the way we know best! :)

N&A wrestling on the bed, one of their fave activities

Abby's mad scientist hair after wrestling

Wake Forest cutie

Mom & Dad getting to relax & loving it!

We won't soon forget all the good times at "Fatfest 2010." We have never eaten so well (or so bad, depending on how you look at it) in a long time. It seriously was so good though - especially that mac'n'cheese - and the company was even better! Bec & Mike - thanks again for hosting - we love you!

Fun memories from our time in Knoxville:
-Nanny playing the dulcimer/vegetable peeler
-N getting SO excited at the Macy's parade floats
-A's blowouts
-N collecting "fairy dust"
-A sleeping in the bathroom
-Gertrude at Krispy Kreme
-Bec looking hot in her new skinny jeans
-The last mile of the Hot to Trot race
-Greg's 2 inch thick cheese
-"Poppy" wine
-Hide & seek with N
-Lora teaching N knock-knock jokes & about "Baby Daddy"
-Those damn dogs
-N's sugar high after his chocolate-iced donut

Friday Funnies

Nate “helping” Greg make dinner in the kitchen...
Nate: Daddy what’s that?
Daddy: It’s PAM spray.
Nate: It looks like bugspray.

Nate went #2 right before getting into the bathtub, and apparently someone who-shall-not-be-named did a sub-par job of “wiping” him…
Nate: What’s that? (pointing to 2 “flakes” floating in the tub)
Me: Not sure bud, just leave it alone.
Nate: It looks like raisin bran!
(The funny thing is – he eats a little bit of Greg’s raisin bran every morning so it actually could have been that, haha!)

Christmas cards!

Anyone who knows me well better know at least 3 things about me:
1. I like to plan ahead...way ahead
2. I stress out...easily...and often
3. I love a good deal! (I get this from my Dad - happy bday btw old man!)

So, since I love to plan ahead, of course I'm already thinking about this year's Christmas card...what outfits I want the kids to wear, the mailing labels I need to make, and what design I want.

Well, this year Shutterfly is making it easy! All I have to do is coerce Greg into getting the tree early (& helping to hold down the kids to get good pictures), and then the rest is a breeze! They have a TON of super cute (and super cheap!) designs this year, and I am very excited to share this little bit of insider info with my fellow bloggers...you can get 50 FREE CHRISTMAS CARDS if you check out this deal.

I want to encourage all of you to consider Shutterfly this year for all your Christmas needs...not only Christmas cards, but awesome gifts like calendars, mousepads, coffee mugs, photo books, keychains and much much more!

Stay tuned for the 2010 Givens Christmas card...it's sure to be an interesting photo shoot with the two kiddos!!

And the party continues...

Since Mum-Mum and Granddaddy couldn't come to Abby's birthday party last weekend, they decided to come for a short visit this weekend! They came bearing lots of new gifts (including some cute stuff for my upcoming bday too)! Abby got 2 new outfits, a little toy doggie (that she is now obsessed with), and......her first "trike!"







They took us all out for a delicious dinner last night at Miller's, and as usual, we ate too much! Including Abby....she chowed down on hush puppies, meatloaf, french fries, and snickers cake. And paid for it that night....she was up half the night with an upset belly :( Poor little thing! No worries though - she was back to her old self today (after a big #2!) and had fun playing with Mum-Mum & Granddaddy all day. She went for another walk on her new trike, and loved taking the dominoes in & out of their box.We are lucky to have TWO sets of grandparents that love our kids so much!! Thank you Mum-Mum & Granddaddy!

Friday Funnies

FUNNY #1:
Last week, while N&P were visiting, Nanny took Nate upstairs to change his clothes. He started to come down the stairs with a gray t-shirt and khaki pants on. I told him to go back up and tell Nanny that didn’t match. (Hello, monochromatic!) So, later in the afternoon, he had spilled something on his shirt and needed to change it again. As he & Nanny were headed upstairs to his room, he told Nanny “Remember, no khaki!”

And then, to top it off, every time Nanny changed his clothes/pjs all weekend, he’d peek over the stairs and say “Mommy, is this ok!?” It’s like he has NO faith in Nanny to pick out fashionable clothes anymore. Too funny!!!

FUNNY #2:
Me: Nate, what do you want for lunch?
Nate: A menu, please!

Abby's 1st Birthday Party

We had Abby's first birthday party yesterday, with family, a few neighbors and Abby's boyfriend Grant :) It was a very small & low-key party (for once!), but fun nevertheless. After the big kids had a few snacks & juice boxes, Abby started to open her gifts. (Or rather, she sat in her rocking chair while Nate opened them for her.) She didn't care one bit, but rather, just enjoyed watching the show! She got a lot of great stuff - toys, clothes, books, etc. And a special treasure/memento box from us, which hopefully she'll enjoy down the road.




This is Abby "dancing" to her new Dora guitar, which was very carefully selected by her big brother! (Though I think he likes it more than she does!)
I was highly anticipating watching her dig into her "smash cake," just because she's such a big eater already :) She definitely got excited when she saw it, but once she discovered there were 10 lbs of icing on there, she got a little frustrated and didn't go all out like I thought she would. She slowly warmed up to it though, and made her usual myriad of funny faces!





And of course, every 1-yr-old needs a teal peacoat and metallic ballet shoes. Thanks Aunt Bebe!! :)Happy 1st birthday sweet Abby Reece!