She's skipping right to sentences

OK, OK, OK sis...I get the picture. If I harass you about reading the blog, that means I actually need to post something for you to read. So this one's for you KK.

Things have been bananas around here lately. Christmas is definitely one of my favorite times of year, but man, it can get crazy. And in typical fashion I am probably trying to accomplish too much in too little time. On top of gift shopping, parties, decorating, and all of the other typical busyness, Jay and I have decided our gift to each other this year is to get our bonus room finished. That means a big TV for Jay and fun new decor for me. Of course, that also means Jay orders a TV and hooks it up and is finished while I agonize over what I'm going to do with colors and fabrics and then when I finally do, I'm going to paint and sew it all myself so that means many hours of work. And OF COURSE I really want to get it done before Christmas because my family will be here and I want everyone to enjoy it over the holiday. Realistically, it will probably get halfway done and I just have to be OK with that. I can only do what I can do, right?

Anyway, this post is really about my sweet little baby Lauren. Lauren has decided to completely skip saying the simple first words like "mama" and "dada" and has gone straight to complete sentences.

Friday night Jay was making some hot chocolate for Audrey and Reed. Lauren walked up to him and said something that sounded a little like "Ah on suh" while holding her hands in the air toward the mugs. After she said the same sounds several times in a row, Jay said "I think she's saying 'I want some'". I told him he was crazy. I mean, she's said ma-ma and da-da before but only when we've prompted her. There was no way she was now asking for hot chocolate with words on her own!

Later I was giving the kids marshmallows for their drinks and Lauren caught sight of the bag from across the room, came straight up to me and said "Ah on suh! Ah on suh!" Jay was not crazy. She was DEFINITELY saying "I want some!" Since Friday she has also picked up the phrase "Eh meh" (Yes mam) which I am very proud of! So she won't say any of our names but she knows how to request the food that she wants and be polite in the process. What more could a mother want?

Here's a pic of little LL helping me decorate the tree. Precious!

And here's the finished product. We love big trees at the McKnight household!

Merry Christmas everyone!

The Mom Song

A friend of mine just sent me this link and I thought it was hysterical! Man, I feel like that everyday....Enjoy!

(go to the bottom of my blog and pause the music on the playlist so you won't be listening to both things at once)

Thanksgiving in DeRidder

I realize this is a little out of order, but I wanted to share our Thanksgiving pictures with everyone. We traveled Tuesday night/ Wednesday morning to spend Thanksgiving with Granny and Papa in good old DeRidder, Louisiana. (We spent the night at a sketchy hotel in Vicksburg, MS) We also got to spend some time with Uncle Ryan, Aunt Katie, Maddie and Anna. Unfortunately, we did not get to see Uncle Adam because they were working him to death at Target. (You know, it being the busiest shopping day of the year and all.) Anyway, we had a wonderful time visiting with everyone and preparing our Thanksgiving meal. The food was great (as always...except for that oyster dressing...sorry Granny...I just can't do oysters!) but the fellowship was even better. The kids always love spending time with Granny and Papa and don't mind spending 12 hours in the car to do it! (By the way, neither do we!)

Granny and Papa wanted to take a picture of us all together for their Christmas card. So, my wanna be photographer husband brought our camera, a tripod and his trusty remote and we gave it a shot. Here are the best of the pictures out of about a hundred shots. And you know what, the kids did great...if only we could get Papa to keep looking at the camera!!

Papa and Granny with Maddie, Anna, Reed, Lauren & Audrey

Uncle Ryan, Anna, Aunt Katie & Maddie

The whole clan (Except for Adam.. we missed you!)

James Reed McKnight... his Jr. and the Third (or "fird" as Reed says...)

Christmas Tree Decorating

Earlier this week, it was time to pick out and decorate our beautiful Christmas tree. We have an artificial one but Jay insists that we get a real tree if we are going to be home for Christmas day. So, after a long day of travel on Saturday, we got out in the bitter cold on Sunday and bought our 13 foot tree from the Boy Scouts. One of my favorite things during the Christmas season is going to pick out a tree as a family. I also really love getting all of the ornaments out every year. They truly hold many memories for me. For example, I know you are all tired of hearing about Disney but this year we added some Mickey Mouse ears to our tree to commemorate our trip. In the years to come, whenever I see that ornament it will always remind me of our wonderful vacation. Every other ornament on the tree holds some special meaning just like that one and it is so fun to take a trip down memory lane, especially at this time of year.

Anyway, this is the first year that I let the kids take their own ornaments and hang them on the tree themselves. What craziness!!! Audrey, in all of her enthusiasm could hardly get any of hers on the tree because the anticipation of the next box opening was just too much for her to handle. Reed basically just wanted to play with his Thomas & Percy ornaments that my mom gave him a few years ago. And Lauren, well let's just say, was in the middle of it all!

I took a picture of what the kids did. This is a close up shot so you could see everything, but just imagine, the rest of the tree is empty! It looked really funny for a while until Mama came in and shuffled things around...just a bit... and then added all the breakable ornaments up high. I'll post a picture of our tree when we are totally done. I just have a few finishing touches to make.

Audrey brought home a little writing assignment the other day. She said that they were supposed to answer the question "What would you do if you were a reindeer?" This is what she wrote. (She had no help to spell the words...they want them to try to sound things out for themselves.) The translation is below...

Audrey said "I would fly all day and night today to Santa."

Just thought it was cute and wanted to share.