Leaves, Leaves, Leaves!!!

 Last weekend we had a family leaf raking day- let me tell you- we have a lot of leaves!!! I t was fun at first and then reality set in- we-have-a-lot-of-leaves! Even with the help of the blower, it took us all day! But the kids really enjoyed being outside "playing"!

This is the before!

Getting ready to rake

They sat here playing and "digging up the tree" for about 30 minutes!!

Cleaning up "her" yard!

All clean and window boxes planted for the winter!

Front all clean...for a few minutes! As we were taking this picture, admiring our hard work, a big gust wind started blowing leaves, and Maya, with a look of disbelief on her face, shouted, "Wait! Stop! We just cleaned up!"

We looked up to see...all these leaves still have to come down!!!!

Decorating for Santa

 Maya and I trimmed the tree one afternoon while Tate was napping- It didn't take too long since it is a 'petite' tree! This was one of those idyllic moments in time that I will always remember...  Maya was so excited to "decorate for Santa", we had the Christmas music playing in the background, she was very curious about each ornament and she loved putting the angel on top!! Once we were done with tree she turned to me and said, "May I have this dance?" and we danced to Christmas tunes for a while, I started to sing along and she looked up to me and said, "Mom, you don't have to sing"!- reality check!!

Our tree!

Admiring the angel!

Final touches!

After determining that there were no presents under the tree, Maya declared, "I'll be the present!"  She definitely is a gift from God!

Admiring the nativity scene!

Tate saw the tree and started marching and saying, "HO, HO, HO!

Showing Tate the ornaments

Daddy checking out the tree!

Outside decorated!

With lights!

        

A Christmas Tradition

 We decided to go pick our Christmas tree out on the coldest/windy day we've had this season, but we were not detered!  Maya has been asking for weeks when Daddy was going to cut down our Christmas tree- she remembered from last year! I love it- a Christmas tradition!!!  So we made the trek across the river and stopped by daddy's work to say hi to his co-workers and the on to the farm....

Tate checking out the situation

And she's off!

I want this one!!!

But I want this one!!!

We convince them to keep looking!!

This is fun!!! (He played peek-a-boo most of the time!)

Let me measure this one...

Got it!

Shake it! The owner told Maya the only way to shake the tree was if she shook too!!

Wrap it up!

Happy Girl!!!

One of my favorite Venet Family Christmas traditions growing up- so glad to continue on as a Salter Family tradition!

Indian Feast