A New Tradition

We took part in a new Christmas Eve tradition this year, hosted by Nana and Putty and featuring an all-star lineup of family and friends.  Instead of describing what a great time we had, we've posted a new photo album to the left side of the page with some really good photos of the players.  (Ginger apparently had her good eye in for the occasion because these are fantastic.)

We think it is safe to say that a good time was had by all, and we look forward to many more years of celebrations like this.  Nice job Putty and Nana!

A Better Christmas Letter

The management at Walt's World has been participating in the Advent Conspiracy this holiday season.  If we haven't shared this with you yet, we encourage you to follow the link and get some ideas for next year. 

The "conspiracy" challenges participants to Worship Fully, Spend Less, Give More and Love All.  To that end, we decided to nix the annual Christmas card and its accompanying expense in favor of an electronic blitz of emails, Facebook postings and a blog entry.  Hopefully, we've got you all covered.

However you receive our good wishes, we hope that you have a merry Christmas and a safe, healthy and prosperous New Year.

And now we present the Walt's World 2008 Year In Review in three minutes:

Overheard 12/16/08

Walt: Daddy, what do you want for Christmas?

Daddy: A happy little boy.

Walt: But Daddy, you already have a happy little boy.  What else do you want?

A Few Reasons Why Walt's Daddy Really Likes Him Right Now

1.  He uses words like 'suddenly' and 'often'.

2.  Lately, he's been insisting that during our nightly football games we say, 'Christmas Hut!' instead of the usual, 'Hut!'

3.  He picks on his mother.  Like the other day when he sneaked up behind her while she was on the step ladder vacuuming the ceiling fan blades, turned the vacuum off and ran away.

4.  He gets really mad when I call him 'Princess Walt' and insists that I then call him 'Car Walt.'

5.  Today, he set up his nativity scene as a football game and announced that the Bulldogs were playing the Cowboys.

6.  He calls me out when I tease him.

7.  This past weekend, he spelled the word 'cold' on the kitchen floor with refrigerator magnet letters after reading it on the faucet handle in the bathroom.  Ginger and I both thought the other had something to do with it.

8.  He frequently breaks out in Christmas carols despite the fact that he only knows about every third word.

9.  When cleaning up the football game/nativity scene before bedtime, he knew exactly where the Baby Jesus had last landed hours before.

10.  More often than not, he tells me he loves me as I leave his room at night.

Thanksgiving, etc.

First up, the Thanksgiving feast at school . . .

What -- you think the pilgrims didn't have chicken fingers and juice boxes at the first Thanksgiving?

Walt's class -- not including Curtsie and Will who are at the allergy table.  God bless preschool teachers.

Moving on to Nashville . . . no pictures of the actual meal on Thursday that featured enough food for a colony of pilgrims (including three, count 'em three, pies), but Daddy did break out the camera for the Christmas decorating that followed the next day.

How many Spicklers does it take to put up a Christmas tree?

And because one state just isn't enough for a proper holiday celebration, we headed up to Kentucky (Glasgow, to be precise) for the Crouch celebration on Saturday.  In order to keep the boys from tearing down the bed and breakfast (seriously, a concern), we made a break for Cave City.  And can I just say, Cave City is awesome.  I remember going there on excursions with my grandparents as a kid . . . Guntown Mountain, the wax museum (you've not lived til you've seen Dolly Parton enshrined in wax), the Alpine slide . . . it's basically the closest thing Kentucky has to Disney World.  But in all our visits to Cave City as kids, we somehow never made it to Saturday's destination . . .

DINOSAUR WORLD!!!!

Should you ever find yourself in south-central Kentucky with a couple of hours to kill and two four-year old boys on your hands, you could do worse than Dinosaur World.  'Cause, uh, they pretty much loved it.

Very scary.

Did someone teach him how to read when we weren't looking?

Dinosaur racing, anyone?  You know what they say . . . you can take the boy (or at least his mom) out of Kentucky, but you can't take the Kentucky out of the boy.  Uncle Woody and Grandpa Bill would be proud!

And finally, we capped off the Thanksgiving celebrations with a Crouch family dinner on Saturday night at the Goodnight Inn in Goodnight, Kentucky.  (Don't you wish that was your address?)  Photo ops abounded.

For the blessings of family and friends, we truly give thanks.  (Everything else is just gravy!)