Merry Christmas!

Kids all dressed up for Church

decorating cookies

Nativity Pagent, Christmas morning and Christmas Eve

an afternoon with Jared

The other day I found myself with an afternoon with Jared. To say I was happy is an understatement. One of my greatest pleasures in life right now is one-on-one time with a child of mine. And Jared does not disappoint. We started out the time in the kitchen...a place I have never loved, but when Jared is with me, it's good. Real good. We made a chex mix for Christmas. Then he helped me clean up the kitchen and put the dishes away. The great thing about Jared is that he likes to work(I will post more on this later). So after actually enjoying cleaning up the kitchen, we decided to watch the last DVD of Planet Earth together. Jared is VERY into animals right now. As we went into the home theater and I was turning on the projector and putting the DVD in, I notice my sweet boy getting pillows and blankets all arranged on the couch not just for him but for me too. This did not surprise me but it touched me and the memory of this simple gesture will stay with me. I have said many times that Jared will be a wonderful husband...he thinks of others constantly, he always says thank you and usually with a hug, I already mentioned how he likes to work and he is the best cuddler on the planet. And that is the reason I wanted to watch the DVD with him, to cuddle with my growing up too fast boy. As I sat down next to him, he lifted up the blanket and put it over my legs and fixed it just so. And as we cuddled and watched he shared all the facts he knew about the animals we were watching. When the show was over, we wrapped a few Christmas gifts together and then the rest of our family was home. I felt rejuvenated like I had just come from the spa. Thanks Jared.

hard work and play

Thanksgiving weekend Carter and Jared decided to make a big pile of leaves. Allen said that would be fine as long as they blew the leaves to the horse farm behind our house when they were done (Allen's job). So, the hours of fun began. They blew and racked leaves and loved every minute. And then they played in them like all children should do many times in their lives. I was able to take some action shots to document this moment of their childhood.

competition

Competition. Carter loves it. Carter likes to come in first. Carter likes to win. Carter likes to do his best...first. Carter loves to play board games. And win. He is very confident that he will win any board game, even though he doesn't always. The best part is when he doesn't win, he is ok. He congratulates the winner and asks if they want to play again, because he knows he will win this time.

This competition is found in school and sports also. He sees no reason to play if you are not trying with all you have to win. And you better follow the rules-rules are everything to Carter. Both of his teachers commented on his report card that he is competitive at school and this is one of the reasons he excels in school. He is always giving his all. He wants everything to be perfect. They say that he doesn't care about the beating others, just about being the best, being first, and winning for himself. And again, when on occasion when he is not, that's ok...because Carter knows that next time, he will be.

When I showed him the teachers comments he said they probably said that because he and a buddy are 20 pages ahead of the class in Math (with the teacher's ok). When I asked why he wanted to be so far ahead, he gave me the look he gives me, his uncompetitive mom, alot and said, "why wouldn't I want to be ahead? It's fun".

I love this trait of Carter's. He will go far in life with this kind of drive. I hope and believe that it will stay at the "wanting to be the best" and not go to the "I want to beat YOU". Carter is too sweet for that kind of thinking.