Well November ended with the boys chipping away ice so that they could go out duck hunting...these boys will hunt until the law says they can't! :o) Than the festivities started to get ready for the Holidays.  Andy had surgery the week of Thanksgiving so we had to plan ahead for some things since he wouldn't be able to lift for quite awhile.  Thanksgiving was celebrated at home as Andy recovered with lots of food and quality family time.  Can't get any better than that!

                                      Little Zoey getting dressed up in some hunting gear...

Normally we wait until the weekend after Thanksgiving to get our Christmas tree but with Andy having surgery we decided to go the weekend before...it was defiantly winter out that day! Alittle chilly going into the tree lot in search of the perfect tree, but we had a blast...Zoey is so bundled up she reminded us of the lil guy in the Christmas Story!

We found the perfect tree and the boys went to work chopping it down, and in the process almost took out Zoey! She was standing off to the side and the tree came crashing down with the very tip of it brushing her coat! Zoey gave them a dirty look for that :o)

Team work!

Hard to believe that our little booger turned 12 already! We celebrated with a blizzard that day and school got out early (which he thought was awesome!) Instead of a cake this year he requested pumpkin bars :o) and ended up blowing out all the candles except for one....for Emily!

What a goof

Somebody was extremely happy with one of his birthday presents...xbox mindcraft

Sibling love

Zoey didn't want her monkey to go on the tree this year....every chance she gets she tries to steal it back :o)

The kids were involved in the after school program Art N Books again this year. They went twice a week for 8 weeks and learned different art mediums and how they related to different stories.  This will be Austin's last art show   :o(  They got all dressed up for the show at the Parkers Event Center and had a blast showing off their hard work.

Austin's art...this pic and next

Bayleann's art this pic and next

Bayleann had her Christmas Dance show on the 14th and it was a wonderful show! Her group danced to Frosty the Snowman and were little snow girls.  They looked absolutely adorable and of course they danced terrifically! This group of girls have been together for a few years now and dance competition together and you can really tell-they are perfect out there. Monie didn't dance this year for the Rockettes but she was back stage helping out and we couldn't miss out on our annual picture!

Bayleann and her bestie Dani

Even Austin was proud of his little sister!

I caught the girls having a tea party in Bayleann's room...they look so cute and played together so well :o) I love capturing these precious moments between sisters!

The tea party moved out into the living room for our enjoyment! Bayleann left for a second and Zoey is trying to steal her cupcake!

Austin had his last (tear) Christmas program as an elementary kid this past Thursday.  He was a reindeer named Prancer....now normally this kid will make sure he is in the back row when they are handing out parts so that he doesn't have one...but he didn't get so lucky this time! His character Prancer was one of Santa's reindeer and throughout the program he got to fight a villain, save snowflake the damsel in distress from train tracks, fight the villain again, and do a western line dance with his fellow reindeer friends.  This play was a hoot! We were laughing throughout the whole thing....of course Austin just told us he had one line to say...if we had known what his part really was we defiantly would have brought the video camera!

The villain (a fellow reindeer)

The big fight

Saving the girl

Fighting over the girl with the villain...Prancer won of course

I found this little toy at Walmart and it says Prancer on it...so we gave it to Austin after his play! Too cute!  He loved it :o)

Well everyone....we hope that you all have a very Merry Christmas!