Christmas/Birthday Whirlwind

I did some poor planning (as, evidently, did my mother-in-law. Launa's BDay (and my Mother-in-laws and nieces) are on January 4th, my sister-in-laws is the 5th, Mark's is the 8th and my baby is due the 26th. So, seriously, the past few weeks really have been a whirlwind. I tried to get my Christmas cards all done early, only to learn that even though I had an email confirmation saying they were arriving, for some reason they never got printed. Sorry, it looks like you'll be getting a Valentine's Card/Birth Announcement instead.

We kicked off the Christmas holiday with the entire Jenks family (all 40 of us) in town. We ate lots of good food, did paintballing, saw a movie, had an adult date, and just had a good time seeing everyone. Launa and Kate played their little hearts out and are still asking for their cousins they don't see very often. We had Christmas Eve with the extended Jenks family at our house. I think there were around roughly 80 people here -- pretty sure it was maximum capacity, but shockingly the house pretty much made it out unscathed. We had Santa come and had a program and dinner. It was a nice night.

New Year's we did another party for Mark's family here and played card games, ate A LOT of food, and celebrated his 30th Birthday a little early (he claims that he always gets jipped and by the time his birthday rolls around, no one wants to get together for parties, much less eat cake).

Launa requested a Chuck E Cheese birthday party this year. It was a great winter birthday party. Simple. Fun. Launa even gave Chuck-E a hug and a high five. Kate was scared to death of him and mostly spent the day stealing cupcakes and hiding from me so she could eat them.

I can't believe my Launa is FIVE!! She has been up to her old tricks lately -- hiding the remote control and the garage door opener when she's mad at me, locking me out of my own bedroom, beating up the neighborhood boys -- today she even had the audacity to call Mark a "terd"... to his face. Seriously, the girl has some gumption, I'm going to give her that. She also has excelled in preschool and in Sunbeams at church where she evidently is an ideal student. She loves to learn and has already mastered most of her letters and is getting very excited for school. And, when in the mood, she still retains the title for my best snuggler. She also is already trying out cooking and wanting to do her own hair (and she is also surprisingly decent at that), and has gotten extremely FAST (she gets in her two-bits and then takes off running. It reminds me of my brother, Kameron). Miss Independent would be a good classification for our little Launa. She keeps me hopping and always guessing what she is going to do next.

The picture reel could use some organization, but at least there is something on here! :) My sister-in-law and I are due a week apart again. Gotta love us doing our belly bump! A few of Launa's BDay party and Mark and Launa on the dock after fishing. The front view of my pregnant belly, and yes, I feel as big as I look.