The Carlos Family: We are THANKFUL!

One of my favorite parts about Halloween is that the day marks the beginning of the holiday season. I was fortunate enough to have the entire Thanksgiving week off, so our week was full of fun! We went to visit Ryan at his fire station. Clayton was in fire truck Heaven! We spent a lot of quality time together as a family going on trail walks, playing in our backyard, and just being together. We went to see Santa Claus the day before Thanksgiving, which was a brilliant idea because there was no line! South Coast Plaza is our favorite place to go to meet Santa because they have the Christmas carousel too. Clayton walked right up, gave his list to Santa and sat on his lap. Chloe, well, she agreed to sit on the floor in front of him as long as Mommy was no more than 2 feet away and Easton sat happily on Santa's lap. Thanksgiving was a quiet day for us, but special nonetheless. We had a nice visit with Papa Louie, Grammie, Gigi, and Uncle Travis and then headed over to Papa Jim and Nonnie's for a delicious dinner. So much to be thankful for this year...3 beautiful, healthy, happy children, children who at one point we never imagined were possible for us to have, a new, huge home that memories are being made in every day, two stable jobs that provide us the flexibility to work, but be home with our children too, good health, and loving families. We are very blessed.

Clayton and Chloe are loving Christmas and everything Santa. They love singing "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" (know most of the words), "Rudolph," "Frosty the Snowman" (that one is hard!), and LOVE the Justin Bieber Christmas CD, especially "The Little Drummer Boy" song, which remains on repeat. I wondered when the "wanting" would begin, and my how it has begun! What does Clayton want? He wants a tool bench and a blue bike. Everything is blue because as you know, pink is for Chloe, not boys like Clayton as he often reminds us. Clayton also wants a Dream Light and a fire truck. What does Chloe want? A new baby, a new baby stroller, and anything and everything related to babies. I'm so happy to see her naturally gravitating toward girlie toys because she is typically a follower of anything and everything Clayton wants and has. We also had a special ELF breakfast to welcome our elves Buddy and Sparkles into our family, which truly marked the beginning of Christmas for us!

Activities are instrumental to these busy babes. We finished our sports camp this month. Clayton was definitely the all star in the camp. At 2 1/2, he knows how to dribble a basketball, so the "coach" was teaching him how to dribble with his left hand! Chloe preferred to "watch" Clayton, but got involved once we encouraged her. It's time for dance for our little princess! They've been begging to go to My Gym again, so we are starting back up in December. They will both be so very happy!

We are so excited to share the next few weeks with our children with a train ride to visit Santa, lots of crafting days, cookie making, bringing toys to CHOC, a Christmas party, Christmas lights, fun with friends, and lots of smiles!

Our sweet little Easton, is still sweet, but is now our sweet little Troublemaker...individual E post to follow!

Here's some pictures that capture our busy month...

Clayton had a stent put in his eye to open up a clogged tear tuct...he was a champ!