It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

Since we're spending Christmas in Birmingham and won't have any visitors here in Georgia, I decided to upload some pictures of our decorations so you can see how festive we are:

First, I give you the Gordon family Christmas Tree...

The mantle, no stockings hung with care though because we forgot them in Birmingham last year.

The half-painted nativity scene (don't ask)...

Decapitated Santa and other holiday pillows.

The column of Christmas cards...

Advent house and other assorted decor

Finally we have Bebe enjoying the present aspect of Advent...

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Last week Lauren was sick with a stomach virus, which she then shared with me and Patrick. So last weekend we didn't do anything, which meant this weekend we had to be super productive since Christmas is almost here. One of our main tasks was to spend $100 at Sears on Christmas decorations. They gave us a $100 credit for being in the military and the only catches were the money had to be spent by Christmas Eve and the items had to be purchased in the Holiday section. So we ended up with Wrapping paper, lights, ornament hooks and three animated reindeer.

Lauren helped Patrick set them up.

Oooooo, pretty....

Mamma what's that?!

Needless to say, Lil' Jon was not too thrilled with the herd of reindeer that invaded his yard.

Today I also had to put together six small gifts for Lauren's daycare teachers -- three in the a.m. and three in the p.m.

Today ended with Patrick heading out to go camping with his ROTC friends at their annual winter camp out and me starting the Bisquoties. I say "start" because it usually takes me 2 to 3 days to make them (when I'm not chasing a toddler). So tonight I made 265 cookies and that's maybe a third of the dough.

Every time I make these cookies I recall how everyone says Grandma Annie was a good cook, she just didn't like to cook. Well hell, you make and icing 600 cookies and tell me how much YOU like to cook. That being said, it's only once a year so I'll suck it up and quit complaining.