It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas . . . in the Johnson home!

I LOVE Christmas, the cold, the snow, the trees, the ornaments, the gift giving, the pies, the food, the red noses and rosy cheeks, the family Christmas portraits (which I have yet to get! some photographer I am!), decorating, the songs, etc. just everything about Christmas is wonderful! Yesterday we got a FREE, yes you read that right FREE Christmas tree - a Fraser Fur tree, $60, 7' tree! I asked the lady at the little tree stand if I could do it in exchange for a free photoshoot and she said yes! Then we came home, let the tree fall and after leftover Thanksgiving dinner we made Christmas sugar cookies and decorated the tree then we frosted the cookies, they wcrtzaeaAWere nasty by the way so we took them to church for the potluck today!, (I'm looking for the lofthouse sugar cookie recipe if you have it could you e-mail it to me, joshsrib@aol.com) As we were decorating we even got dad in on the action, he made a power T tree with orange and white! Then we watched a classic Christmas movie, Elf, ate leftover pie and Christmas shaped pretzels! Time with family is always well spent!

Isn't he sooooo cute? He was trying to sleep under the Christmas tree!

The blue lips are actually green . . . she thought the food coloring somehow tasted good . . . it didn't and her mouth s still a little colored today!

This was right after their impromptu albeit silly posing!

Being a photographer I'm always telling the kids to pose, this is their impromptu attempt at it!

This year's newest additions: I was going to get this one for Abby but she wanted the one I picked out for Andrew and surprisingly Andrew wanted the one I picked out for Abby . . . wait, maybe I shouldn't be surprised!

This is the homemade one, I got the idea from Hawaii, it's a starfish!

This one is mine, some of the ladies took me out for my b-day and this is one I got, it's made of tin.

This one is Joshua's so far it's my favorite on the tree!

Here it is, our free tree! Isn't God good? He cares so much about every part of us!

This is before the haircut I gave it . . .

This is after, I guess I WON'T be giving Martha Stewart or Katie Brown a run for their money this year!

Wow! That picture just keeps getting worse and worse . . . and to think I'm putting it on the world wide web for the whole world to see my handiwork or lack thereof!

Yum!

Andrew enjoyed eating the m and m's more than the cookies!

Notice our family picture that's supposed to be hanging on the tree? Instead we're hanging out at the manger!

Can you guess who put us there?