Ornament Pros

After countless years of decorating the Christmas tree, the kids have become professional ornament hangers, requiring little to no instruction, keeping all ornaments intact (no breaks this year!), and finishing in a decent amount of time, with no tears or fights!

It was a smaller tree this year, so Mom had to pare down the number of ornaments to only the most meaningful ... and we still couldn't get them all on the tree.

Elf Movie

After the parade, it was time to relax with the annual showing of the Elf movie. It was even better with all the good food: Papa Pete's pizza and tons of desserts. We also had lots of Kennedy-holding time.

Elf Float

This was the 2nd year of the Country Cousins' Elf Float in the Castle Rock Christmas Lights Parade through downtown. We had lots of elves on the float, including Jillian, Bridget and Torion, the twins Ava and Harper, Josie Jean and Mom Emmy, Jordan and Jacob and Mom Debbie, and Cale ("Buddy") and Erika ("Jovie") and Baby Kennedy ("Susie").

Cale and Dad built the updated float on Papa Bob's old flat bed trailer, this time with a roof in case of rain, and the kids helped string lights. It was touch-and-go for awhile: for some reason, the registration was lost, so we had to sign up a second time; then the generator wouldn't start, but Uncle Steve came to the rescue; and the parade route was very narrow, leaving little room for the float or even the elves walking along.

Pre-sick Christmas Pic

No posts this week, since all the kids have been sick at home, missing school and practices and just being miserable on the sofa. So, here's a photo from church before they all got sick:

Lower Columbia Elite 16-1 Volleyball Team

Jillian will be playing club volleyball this season with Lower Columbia Elite, after making the 16-1 (Black) team along with RAL teammates Macy and Evelyn. They'll play Power League, along with a couple big travel tournaments in Tacoma and Eugene, and maybe even Las Vegas.

Longview Christmas Parade

Cold was the word for the night! We met up with Grandma Cindy near City Hall, and by chance, our next-door neighbors were there, as well.

The parade was 1-1/2 hours long, with some very nice floats (including Uncle Jason's metal elk statue) and lots of candy, but we could hardly wait to get back to the car to warm up.

Tree Hunting

It took awhile and a couple tree farms, but we finally found our Christmas tree. We started out at the Eufala Heights tree farm, a new and small outfit, and it was nicely laid out and taken care of, but no Noble Firs. Grannie and Papa did find their tree there, though. So, we went down the road to Ferncrest, which was the opposite - quite a large production with many acres of trees, 2 gift shops, a train ride and Santa Claus. They had a lot of Nobles, though short in height, so we hiked for quite awhile, eventually finding this one:

By chance, we happened to run into the Johnson family, and little Kennedy: