Merry Christmas!!!

Have a fun and safe holiday season!

Lots of Love,

- The Cunninghams

Love Birds

I saw these birds while I was in the Doctor's office waiting for an appointment. I've seen them before..Normally they don't seem to know each other exists, but this time they were snuggled up on their little swing. Cute, huh?

Boys will be boys

Yesterday William and I blew off some energy the neighborhood playground.

The day before that, it rained... a lot.

I saw Grandma kissing Santa Claus...

Well, actually, that's St. Nick she's kissing... and if you look close enough, you might recognize that jolly old man to be Grandpa G!

For anyone who doesn't know the story of St. Nicholas, he was the original Santa Claus! St. Nicholas was a wealthy Bishop (hence the garb) who loved providing gifts to others. He was big on the element of surprise, so he was known for delivering gifts at night so the recipient would find it in the morning.

One of the more famous stories is about a poor man with three daughters. The man was distressed because his three daughters were of age, but he had nothing for their dowries, so the girls were unable to marry. One night while their laundry was out to dry, St. Nicholas filled their stockings with bags of gold. The man was overjoyed and his daughters were able to marry.

The name Santa Claus actually comes from the Dutch pronunciation of St. Nicholas, which is Sinter Klass. Early Dutch settlers who came to NY brought with them the tradition of Sinter Klass to the United States. Neat, huh?

Anyway - it's too bad we weren't in Jackson this weekend because I think William would have much preferred to see this St. Nick than our mall Santa.

Inspired

Inspired by the pictures our friend Jackie recently posted to her Blog, I broke out the camera and tried my had at ornament pictures.

This is what I was able to take before the kids started poking each other.

Thanks for the inspiration Jackie!!!

Get out your wallets, 'cause here comes Santa Claus...

William went to visit Santa in the mall for the first time ever. While the set up was a beautiful Polar Express snow globe theme, I was a little bummed by the whole experience.

The Polar Express is one of William's favorite movies, so the line to get to Santa was pretty exciting. But then we got to the big man in red...

Now... I admit that it's possible my childhood memories are clouded with the Santa experience I've seen in movies. What I expected was happy-helpful elves, lots of fake snow, and a Santa sitting among a pile of presents greeting every child with a jolly "ho, ho, ho". Instead, there was a sales rep with a clipboard wanting to know which picture package I was committing to purchasing. So, right off the bat, I got the impression that Santa wasn't interested in seeing William until I handed over $17.

Is this what the mall Santa has come to? What happened to the idea of luring people to the mall by letting kids see Santa for free? Perhaps that was never the case...

Never-the-less, after committing to package C, William got to stand near Santa and get his picture taken. Maybe today's constant liability issues.. or our extra-sensitive stranger danger sensory means kids aren't allowed to sit on Santa's lap anymore, but I felt a little cheated. Or maybe kid-on-lap treatment comes with package D.. I guess I should have asked.

In the end, Santa handed William a sticker (that's right, folks! Santa doesn't even hand out candy canes anymore), and we walked away with this image on a flash drive. You know what? I don't think Santa even asked William what he wanted for Christmas. :(

Happy Birthday Teddy!!

Take that Economy

Look what showed up in our driveway on Tuesday.

And thanks to Elizabeth, and her mad negotiating skills, it hardly cost us anything.

Playing the Piano

Perhaps we have a pianist in our future? I'm just happy she's using her hands (instead of her feet) this time.

Singing Christmas Tree

(photo courtesy of www.carolinavoices.org)

This Sunday, we took the kids to their first theater production. We won tickets to see the Singing Christmas Tree, a production by Carolina Voices.

For fans of the Three Amigos.. no, the Singing Christmas Tree is not the same as the singing bush. It was actually really neat. They went through a history of "Christmas in the Carolinas" and sang songs of the different lineage that makes up our culture today. Along with the choir on a tree, they had dancing and muppets. It was lots of fun for the kids.

As entertaining as it was, Megan is one year old, so she has a short attention span. We hit her expiration around intermission, so that's when we left. We did get to see Santa on stage and sing "Santa Claus is coming to town" before we left, so it was a good way to end the show.

Feeding the ducks with Grandpa

One big perk to visiting Grandma and Grandpa in Texas is that they live right next to a nice park, complete with a lake and ducks to feed!

Check out all the pictures: click here

Happy Birthday Elizabeth!!

Cousin Jillian

While at G & G C's house, Cousin Jillian came by for a visit.

Jillian is only 5 months younger than Megan, but Megan seems like a giant around Jillian.

Megan enjoyed playing "around" her camera aware cousin.

See more pics.

Thanksgiving Roadtrip and Graceland

Hello blogger readers. I hope you are not still suffering from Thanksgiving overload.

Well, the Cunninghams are back home now after a long and fun trip to see the family. Over the next couple of days we'll share with you all of the fun that we had.

I'll spare you the slide show of the 345 pictures snapped this past week. I'll just post the interesting and cute pictures.

The week started and ended with a two day drive through Tennessee to see G & G Geibel. While passing through Memphis on the way to Texas, I picked up my brother who flew in just to help out with the drive. Thanks Craig!!

(Craig running some energy out of Will)

Since this was his first time in Memphis, we just had to stop at Graceland.

It was much smaller than I remember.



And gaudier. :)

(William checking out one of Elvis's earlier costumes.)

Happy 1st Birthday, Ethan!!

Can you believe this little cutie is one year old already???? Amazing!

Happy Birthday Ethan!

Happy Thanksgiving!

We've been keeping up this blog for almost a year now, and as I go back through the postings, I realize how important you all are to our family.

Our travels, the visits, and all the correspondence is what keeps us going from one day to the next. We're thankful to be able to share those moments with you.

So, while you're eating your turkey, or watching the parade, or doing whatever traditions you normally follow on Thanksgiving day, know that we're thinking about you and thanking God for the moments we've shared over this past year.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

Phone Home

Megan kicked off her Thanksgiving holiday early with a week at Grandma G’s house! It looks like she’s having fun. :)

See pictures of her visit so far: Click Here

Bear Camp 2

The Adirondacks is the original Bear Camp, but while we were in Pigeon Forge this weekend, we stayed at Bear Camp 2! The name fits because we stayed in the American Bear Cabin that was decked out floor to ceiling with bears.

William loved the game-loft. Between the air-hockey, foosball, pool table and arcade games, he requested we stay there all day.

See more pictures: Click Here

Casually strolling in shark infested water

While in Tennessee, we took the opportunity to visit other local attractions. One very kid friendly place is the Ripley's Aquarium.

If you are a frequent reader of AtHomeWithTheCunninghams, you may remember an earlier visit to the Ripley's Aquarium in Myrtle Beach.

Well, the one in Gatlinburg was equally interesting and photogenic.

As in Myrtle Beach, there were many Moe's for Megan to look at.

Dolly Parton's Dixie Stampede

Picture courtesy of www.dixiestampede.com
Here we are again, putting a few hundred more miles on the van. This time we met Grandma and Grandpa G. in Pigeon Forge TN for a short weekend visit. If you've never been, it's worth it to go at least once. There are lots of attractions in a beautiful mountain setting.

One main attraction is Dolly Parton's Dixie Stampede. This dinner show includes cowboys, horses, ice skating, singing, pig and ostrich racing all in a giant dirt arena. You're served a dinner of a whole cornish hen and vegetable soup, however silverware is not allowed! The whole experience was amazing. Both kids loved it. In fact, I don't think I've ever seen Megan clap so much.

The South side won (of course), but it was fun sitting on the North because for the Christmas show, we were on the "North Pole" side of the house. In fact, we were in the front row! The only down-side to that was that when the horses ran by, some dirt was kicked out of the arena and landed on Grandma G's plate!! (ha ha ha ha) Sorry, Mom! That'll always be funny. Our waiter was very responsive and offered a brand new plate.

2 1/2 Years... 65,000 Miles

Our van hit a milestone this weekend. 100,000 miles.

In the past two and a half years we have put over 65,000 miles on this car visiting friends and family. That equals out to and average of 2,200 miles per month.

Thanks for the good times and here's to another 100,000.

BTW, disregard where the speedometer needle is pointing. :)

A Song from William

While bathing the other day, William sang a beloved children's song. I was washing him and rinsing him and humming along before I realized exactly what he was singing...

"Row, row, row your boat, gently down the stream...

Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily

Life is full of screams."

Ha ha ha ha.

Chocolate World

If you've been on the Disney attraction "It's a Small World", then you've been to Chocolate World. Only, remove those cute little kids that represent each nation and replace them with dancing bars of chocolate and reese's cups. The whole experience is a little unnerving (and I suspect more so if you're diabetic), but who can resist riding in a giant hershey kiss through a simulated cocoa factory? Charlie Bucket couldn't, and neither could we!



We survived the tour without spotting any Oompa-Loompas, but Ryan was pulled away to test a new Hershey's product. I don't know how much we're allowed to blog about them, but Ryan's would describe them as: chocolate-covered, crunchy, and infused with a kick that could wake you up in the mornings.

Happy 40th Birthday Uncle Craig!!!!

40 is a big one!!! Enjoy your day - we're all very excited to wish you a Happy Birthday in person soon. :)

Click here to see Bloopers

Just the way I like them.. big and hard!

I'm talking about pretzels... (sicko) Lucky for me, the Intercourse Pretzel Factory makes a wide variety of pretzels. Hard, soft, and even chocolate covered!

Ryan and I made some time for Intercourse (umm... that's Intercourse PA - get your minds out of the gutter, people!) on our recent trip to Pennsylvania. The town is in the middle of amish country, which is interesting by itself - but add a pretzel factory that gives free tours and we're there!

Trick or Treat!

The Trick...

The Treats!

Click here: For entire Halloween Gallary

Happy Halloween

See pictures of the pumpkin carving process.

Sppppoooooky Cave...

... Not really, but it's close to Halloween, right? While in Hershey, we visited Indian Echo Caverns. A cool little cave with a very informative tour. The tour guide told us all about the history. Native American's used the cave for shelter and food storage back in the day. A hermit lived there for a while, but ended up dieing of over-exposure to smoke fumes. It was really neat.

The picture above is a cave pond.. crystal clear and completely still. Below, this just cracked us up, is graffiti! They're three sets of initials carved into a stalagmite. They haven't let anyone write on the cave rocks in over 100 years, so this is really old graffiti.. but what is so funny is that back in the day, they vandalized in Times New Roman.. with serifs and everything!

The Sweetest Place on Earth

As mentioned earlier, Ryan and I have recently celebrated our 5th Anniversary. Five years ago, we were married on Oct 18th, The Sweetest Day... litterally! It says so on the calendar.

So, it only makes sense that we would celebrate our anniversary in the sweetest place on earth, Hershey PA!

We had loads of fun. It's a very kid-friendly place... in fact, with so many kids, we almost felt bad we didn't bring ours. (almost) They had a good time hanging out with Grandma and Grandpa C. Check out their blog for pictures.

A Throne for the Birthday Girl?

I believe everyone deserves to feel special on their birthday... but a throne?? I guess now-a-days the kid-focused birthday facilities have thought of everything.

One thing I know for sure, William had fun!

Click here to see all the pictures.

How to Play the Piano

Step 1: Remove Right Sock

Step 2: Remove Left Sock

Step 3: Play!

Today's special is.... Oatmeal!

It's official! William is big enough to enjoy breakfast at the breakfast bar.

Since he started, every morning he asks if he can eat his breakfast up on the stool. He climbs up by himself and often reads magazines while he's eating.

Oh.. my little boy is growing up fast.

5 Years Ago...

I can't believe it's been five years!! Ahh... that was such a fun day.