Merry Christmas!!

We hope you all enjoyed your time with your families over the holidays, and had a wonderful Christmas!  And now for a quick update from our house... and a little about Malea's first Christmas: )

About a month ago, Joel and I were at Coralridge mall doing a little shopping.  We happened to be walking by Santa and noticed there was no line.  We thought with it being her first Christmas, and with there being no line, we might as well swing in and snap a quick picture of Malea and Santa.  Boy was that a disappointment!  For starters, Santa wasn't even wearing a santa suit.... he was wearing a plaid shirt with a hideous vest overtop (that should have been my first clue: )  Call me old fashioned, but Santa isn't Santa without his big red suit!  To top it off, he was a GRUMP!  Seriously he had no interest in our adorable little daughter sitting on his lap peering up at him.  He just stared straight ahead at the camera, without a smile really, with his foot up on a stool... in the meantime, Malea was looking up at him trying to figure out who the heck he was... it was so cute.  I even made the comment "Oh get a picture of that!"  but the crabby picture lady snapped no pictures.  HMPH!  So 5 minutes and $30 later, Joel and I both sort of wished we hadn't even bothered stopping.  Atleast we got one cute picture out of the deal I guess. 

We had the Volz Christmas the first weekend in December.  It really was a great time- my aunt, uncle, and cousin Monica were back from California.  It didn't take long for us to pack my aunt and uncle's house.

 Monica, Jodi, Malea, and Heidi

 Munchie and Malea

 Dad with the Ballard Boys

 Mitchell providing us with entertainment.  I believe he was singing "Mr. Turkey": )

Uncle Peter & Malea

A week ago Sunday was our family Christmas at my folks', and we had an AWESOME day!  I told Mom and Dad that I think it was my most enjoyable family Christmas ever!  It was such a fun, relaxing day, and with it being a week before Christmas, we didn't have to rush to another Christmas and were able to just hang out all day with one another.  We went over first thing in the morning after everyone got up... we even took Malea over in her p.j.'s since we were eating breakfast at my folks': )  Here is a family picture... good thing we took this one, because I don't think we took anymore after we got her dressed for the day.

 This is a doll that Malea got from my folks in her stocking.  If you press her belly, she giggles, and as you can tell in this picture, it cracks Malea up!!

After the kids opened all of their gifts, my mom and dad did the coolest thing. They had transformed my old bedroom into a store with tables full of awesome gifts. They drew names (I was lucky enough to go first... it must have been rigged since they love me most- LOL kidding of course: ) so I got to go upstairs and pick out any gift I wanted!! And they were AWESOME gifts! It was hard to decide! After my siblings, spouses, and I had all gone through, they drew numbers and we got to go through again! It was seriously the coolest idea. Thanks so much Mom and Dad! Like always, you REALLY overdid it.

 Malea got tuckered from all the action, so Papa cuddled her to sleep... awe so precious!!

 Daddy helped Malea open presents, and she tore into them pretty good!

 Malea loves when Great-Grandpa Brenneman talks to her

 This is one of our favorite Malea-looks... when she bites her bottom lip and lets those cheekers puff out: )

 Leave it to Aunt Sara to find something like this!! 

 Her cousins are so good to her.  She got to cuddle with Nolan in Papa's recliner.

 Thanks for the great Christmas, Grammy and Papa!!

Joel and I were so excited for Malea's first Christmas.  So excited in fact that I failed to wrap her presents until Christmas Eve: )  Hah!  We really enjoyed our Christmas with our baby girl, and wanted to share a few pictures from our day with you.

 Thanks to the Glunz's for the beautiful borrowed Christmas tree: )

 Malea's stocking... made with lots of love by Great-Grandma Vaupel!!

 HAH!  Talk about bed-head!!! 

 She had fun opening presents, but lost interest after a while.

 Malea and Daddy on Christmas Day

On Christmas Day we had Joel's family Christmas at our house, and had an awesome time with his folks, Grandma Vaupel, Aunt Shirley, Cousin Tisha, Ryan, and their son Cael.  It was so fun haivng everybody here, and we really enjoyed our day.  I need to borrow Sue's camera so I can get some pictures from our day on here... I was too busy hosting to take many pictures, but here is one to tie you over of Cael and Malea: )

On a side-note, Malea is so close to crawling.  She gets up on all 4's and rocks back and forth, lunges forward, scoots backwards... just about everything except for crawling forward.  If you put something in front of her she really wants, she is able to scooch forward on her belly to grab it, but doesn't have the hang of crawling yet.  I know she is so close though.  She has perfected the backwards scooch.  She really flies on our hardwood floor.  The other day Joel and I were playing with her on the rug in the living room, and she started scooting backwards... before we knew it, she started to fuss because she had scooted completely around the couch and could no longer see us.  I think I am going to start putting a mop underneath her belly so she can mop the floor as she goes: )  She is also extremely close to sitting up from laying on her back or tummy.  She will be playing on her tummy, then roll to her side and sit almost completely straight up on her own.  I still have some videos I want to get on here, but I'm already in bed for the night and don't feel like getting up to get the camera to get them on here... so sit tight and I'll try to do that this week.  Hope you all had a great Christmas!!  And since we didn't have enough Christmas cards to send to everybody we wanted to, I thought I would post it on here too!  Merry Christmas!!!