Lights, Lights and more Lights!!!

Last night we went to our second annual Benton Christmas parade. Last year Sydney wasn't even a year old yet and just sat and watched everything go by and didn't have a reaction to all the displays and floats. This year Dennis,Kali and Parker came with us. Although it was sooo cold at the parade I think we all had a great time. My camera was not taking very good pictures but I had to post them because it's a memory that I hope Sydney starts to look forward to every year.
These Pictures were taken with the Benton court house all lit up behind us.

Parker and Sydney loved it when the pony floats would come by.

This is a horrible picture that this guy took for us with the light shining behind us but this is a group shot of all of there.

Parker is such a lover! He had he head laying on Sydney's shoulder looking at the Christmas trees.
Sydney petting the polar bears.

The court house

Thanksgiving 2009

This year I had Thanksgiving lunch at my house. We had a great lunch and ate way too much. Mom was absent this year since she was sick. We even went to the Thanksgiving Old Navy sale. Dennis and Kali let us borrow their blow up jump house..THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!!! The kids had a blast with it. Sydney is electric!!! Look at that hair!
Sydney enjoying her Thanksgiving dinner.

I am so thankful for my family!!!!

Halloween 2009

This Halloween post is late because as soon as Halloween was over we started working on getting thing together for our Branson trip. On Halloween night we went to East Union Baptist Church to there fall fest. After the fall fest we went to another local church and truck or treated. We finished the night with trick or treating in a east end neighborhood. We were exhausted by the end of the night. This year Sydney really enjoyed participating in all the activities. She was a pink "friendly" monster for Halloween.

We tried to get a group shot of the cousins. Brooke didn't want to get in the pic and Lauren had already ran off with one of her friends. Sydney was not diggin Jack's mask to his costume!

Sydney with the dum dum tree! After she picked one I turned around to go to the next game and I looked and she wasn't there. She was still at the dum dum tree picking suckers! ha
What do I win?

Getting down in the jump house.
Attempt at a family pic on Halloween night. Sydney always has another agenda.


Sydney loved riding the "ho ho".

I lost Stephen and Sydney half way through the fall fest and looked everywhere for them. This is where I finally found them riding this train. I laughed so hard! Stephen looks like he barely fits in the barrel.
Let's see what I have in here.
This was at the trunk or treat.
Can I eat this now?
Target game at the trunk or treat.

Branson, Mo

Last Thursday we headed out for our first family trip. We decided to go somewhere close and so we chose to go to Branson, MO. Stephen and I haven't been in eight years. We really wanted to stay at the landing in the heart of all the newest shops!! I was worried about traveling 4 hrs with a toddler but she did great! See....
Our hotel was next to a river and right next to the river was this amazing fountain/light/music show that went off every hour!!!

Sydney got to make her first Build A Bear!!!! She really enjoyed the whole process until it was time to pick out her clothes. She was too distracted to pick anything out. We went with a polar bear Christmas bear. The past two weeks it seems like Sydney will do anything to get your attention!!! All the older people down town would stop and talk to Sydney and make such a big fuss over her and she ate it up!!!! Here she is running down the sidewalks acting wild!!
I asked her to smile and look at momma and this is the pose I got!
The first night we were there the town had there annual Christmas tree lighting!! We had a family pic made with Santa who stays in the bottom of the town Christmas tree. Sydney went right to Mrs Claus.
Stephen and Sydney in front of the town tree.
We went to the Branson Zoo while we were there. It is pretty small but Sydney loves any kind of animal so I knew she would love it. This was a large tank that had 5 sharks and a logger head turSee what I mean!!! No reservations about touching this snake!!!This picture was taken inside of the Bass Pro shop fish tank.
Sydney has this on her Christmas wish list for Santa.
On every corner was these riding machines (I don't even know what to call them). Sydney would scream every time she would see one. "I wanna ride!!" We gave in a few times but it was .75 each time!On Saturday we ate at Joe's Crab shack. Our waitress asked if Stephen wanted a bib and He said no that's okay and I was nodding my head the whole time SO guess who got a bib??!!! We laughed so hard!!!Sydney wanted to pose with her shrimpees
We only went to one show while we were there. This is at the front of theater. We went to see The Miracle of Christmas. It was AMAZING!! Sydney loved it!! She would clap and wave her hands in the air. I really want to go back and watch Noah when it comes back.
30 minutes before the show starts a few of the characters bring out some of the animals in the show to get a close look at them. This little girl ADORES her daddy and loved spending so much time with him on the little trip we took. I'm glad we went to Branson. We had a blast and enjoyed having our family time.
This was our last night and we started out to have dinner by the fire but went inside because we were worried it might be too cold for Sydney. I had the best lasagna I've ever had here!! I didn't get any pictures of Sydney at the pool but she loved playing in the pool even though it was so cold to us. She didn't want to get out!! Good memories.