To our little secret Elf,

Thank you!

Jump!! Burgon Family Party!!

There is no other way to have a Burgon family party.......... jumping in feet first and having a good time! Thanks to mom and dad for throwing the funnest swarray, I personally think, we ever had! Kids were able to run and have fun and the best, get worn out! Even the adults were kicking kids off bouncers to get in on the action! Good food, good laughs and always good times!

Santa came!!!

All Tay wanted was the 1,365 piece Lego Star Wars MTT Battle Ship and Harry Potter 5!

Austin wanted a Nintendo DS with Mario Party!

Jake wanted a basketball and basketball hoop!

Emmie Got a Pony!!

Mom was very surprised by an Ipod Nano!

Dad got a well deserved computer chair!

Thank You Santa for coming to the Griffin Home!!

Christmas Eve Traditions...

Our Christmas Eve tradition has always a candle lit yummy dinner beside our glowing fire. This year a Honey Baked Ham, cheesey potatoes, corn, salad and rolls. Can't forget the Martinelli's served in goblets.



We loved the fact that Grandma and Grandpa Phillips excepted our invitation to join us for our "out of control with excitement" Christmas Eve dinner!! Lots of talking, burping and giggles from the boys were part of dinner to! (The Griffin house just wouldn't be the "Griffin house" with out any of that!) Thank you Grandma and Grandpa for coming and enduring all the fun! We love you both very much!!!

Emmie fell asleep eating dinner... I believe she wore herself out from watching her brothers!



After we then fixed a plate of food, piled in the car and drove to see Uncle Dick. What a great change he has made in his life,I'm proud of him and who he has become! He is very dedicated to serving the Lord.



We then said our goodbyes for the night and went home to wait for Santa to come. We watched the traditional "Christmas Vacation" movie and ate lots of popcorn, M&M's and licorice. The boys wanted to watch the news to see if they were tracking Santa, Austin was our first to fall asleep, then Taylor said he was going to bed it was about 10:30 and finally Jake! Both Taylor and Jake really had a hard time falling asleep but eventually it happened!

Here comes Santa Clause!!!!!!!!

I see him.... I see him!

Here he comes!

Taylor loved the wind from the Helicopter!

What style... he flies in on a helicopter!

Nothing better than watching your kids in a magical moment! They were all speechless!

Traditions!

Our family is the only family left to carry on the Phillips Family Tradition of going and finding the perfect REAL Christmas tree no matter how cold, no matter how far, no matter what life threatening experience we come across! With that in mind we decided to go and try to find the Alpine Tree Farm. Ron usually wakes up early Saturday morning, the Saturday after Thanksgiving, to go stand in line for 3-4 hours just to get a permit to cut our tree down. But we lucked out this year and were able to cut a tree in Alpine at the tree farm on Friday!! This was by far the easiest tree cutting we've ever had. There were rows and rows of trees to choose from so we spent about 2 hours looking when Taylor came across the perfect tree!! There was no snow to climb through, no scary ice roads to try to get up or slide down... hehehe! No worrying about which branch Ron was going to cut(above his feet or below his feet...hehehe!) We tagged our Tree and had the "Expert" come cut it down, load it on his 4 wheeler trailer and bring it to our car!


Jake wouldn't come get in the picture above because he was afraid he would lose his spot on the 4 wheeler. It was cute how the "expert " let the boys ride on the 4 wheeler to the car..... they thought that was the coolest!

And here I am with Emmie!

We love the tradition of cutting down our own tree. Ron says this every year...."I know it's a pain and a lot of work to cut a tree down but it's the memories and the experience of it all that is worth it!"

I totally agree!