Most of January

I haven't posted much this month.  We've really just stayed home.  The big news is that Annie is walking.  She took her first steps on Dec. 27.  John came home from the hunting camp and she stood up and took three steps towards him.  But then she didn't walk much after that.  Just a step or two every few days. Last week she began going further and this week she is all over the house.  She's still very stiff legged, though.  I have several videos of her that Ben took over the past few weeks that I'll post.  I'll try to take a video of her today really walking.

 Ben took this picture of Mollie playing in a fort they had built.

 Annie practicing walking to me.

 This is how Annie likes to drink -- no hands.

 We've had some beautiful 70 degree days last week and got to play outside.  Ben and Mollie prepared food in the playhouse for Annie and me to eat.

 Annie discovered the little playhouse for the first time.

 Mollie got these cool shades and headband as a party favor at Margaret's birthday party.

 The kids had to use props to tell a fable for presentation.  Mollie and I acted out the fable of Juno and the Peacock.

Ben's Sunday school class recited Psalm 23 as the Call to Worship for the Sunday evening service.  There are usually at least 12 kids in his class but I accidentally scheduled this for the Sunday before Martin Luther King and a lot of people were out of town. (I'm Ben's Sunday School teacher.) I was excited that seven showed up.  I truly thought there was only going to be four.

Ben's Drawing

This is one of my favorite things Ben has drawn lately.  It's an abstract drawing of a race.  You can see the faces in the stands and the blurs along the bottom are the cars speeding by.

Princesses

  Mollie wanted Annie dressed in the Cinderella dress that matched hers.

Since Mollie was wearing a veil, Mollie put Annie's blankie on her head so that they would match.

John

John took some time off and spent most of last week at the camp.  There was one particular deer that they had been seeing on camera that he really hoped to see.  They named him Big Tall.  The temperature dropped to crazy cold 15 degrees mid-week but John was determined to hunt.  On Thursday, the coldest day, Big Tall walked out about 9 a.m. and John took a shot.  He knew he had hit him, but all day Thursday passed and he couldn't find the deer.  Thursday afternoon a neighbor brought his dog to help hunt for him.  Still no deer.  Friday morning John sat on his stand, but after he got down he started looking for Big Tall again.  We were talking on the phone about lunch time when John found a second spot of blood.  The deer had gone in a completely different direction than he had thought.  He called the neighbor with the dog.  He brought him back out and this time they found the deer.  Because the temperature had been so cold, the deer was still fresh.

Marley, the dog that found John's deer.

After nearly a week at the hunting camp, John's beard had gotten out of control.  He trimmed it up before church Sunday.

Sunday night John was ordained as an elder in our church.  After taking vows, the other elders laid hands on the new elders and deacons and prayed for them.  John's dad was able to come even though he had quadruple bypass not quite five weeks ago.  He is the man in the front wearing the navy sweater.  He has his hand on John.  (I probably wasn't supposed to be taking pictures, but I have an addiction.)
 

The elders "offered the right hand of fellowship" to the newly ordained elders and deacons.  Lots of loud back slapping man hugs.

Mollie and Rosie

 Mollie insisted on taking Rosie to dance today.

Annie was there

Yay for Fran! She took pictures of Annie at Nana and Grandaddy's house even if I didn't.

 Annie is holding the lamb slippers that were in her stocking.

 Blowing out the candles on the Happy Birthday Jesus cake.

 And a couple of more pictures from Fran that I liked.

After Christmas

 Ben loves his chemistry set.

 Making glow in the dark slime!

 Annie and Rosie in their Elsa dresses.  MawMaw Wilma made Mollie's cape.  The doll-sized Frozen dress was Mollie's Christmas gift from MV and Janey.

 Ben and Mollie love the bath crayons that Annie got for Christmas from Adelyn.

The weather hasn't cooperated very well for using the telescope.  We finally all got to look at the moon with it and it was amazing.

Christmas Day

 Santa always brings Ben, Mollie, and Annie's presents to MawMaw and PawPaw's house.  You can see that Santa has been by.

 Mama videoed them coming into the room.  Mollie was a little upset.  The doll that Santa left was not the exact one she had in mind when she talked to Santa.  However, she soon decided that she liked it.  John pointed out that it looks just like her which is better than a brown haired doll.

 Ben wore his new Mississippi State hoodie all day.

 New boots from MawMaw and Pawpaw.

 Mollie with the WORST gift ever purchased by MawMaw -- a Frozen wand that plays "Let it Go" if you even breath on it.  John put it in a box in the back of his truck on the way home hoping it would use up all the battery as it bounced along.  No such luck!

 Somehow John made it all the way through college without getting a cowbell.  With the awesome season they had this year, he kept saying he wished he had one.  T'Mara helped me get one for him.  She even hand-painted it.

 Mollie loved the matching outfits MawMaw and PawPaw got her and Rosie (according to the box the doll's name is Shannon.  Mollie named her Rosie, though.  John calls her Shannon Rose just to annoy Mollie.)

 Nerf guns from Uncle Will!

 Grandaddy had quadruple bypass surgery just a couple of weeks before Christmas so we made a quicker trip to their house this year.  We arrived in the afternoon and opened presents, but left right after supper.

 Mollie was very excited about her beautiful birthstone ring.

 Mollie is showing Rosie her new doll-sized tent set.

Somehow Annie is not in any of my pictures from Nana and Grandaddy's house.  Whoops!  She really was there. Maybe Fran has a picture of her!