More Projects and Christmas Memories for the Ferrells

We've been busy at the farm with lots of projects and activities.  One project that we've started is the living room fireplace. 

The fireplace is one of those house projects that we never finished when we were building our house.

Daddy came over and helped Dave with the project.  They started by framing around the gas fireplace insert.

Then they put the cement board up around the fireplace.

Then I went to Lowes and got some 6x6 squares of the matching tiles and also a 12x12 piece with little one inch squares of the matching tiles.  Which one do you like?

Here's the 6x6 tiles . . .

Here's the little tiles and the 6x6 tiles together . . .

Which one looks the best?

This is as far as I've gotten on the fireplace.

Another project I've been working on is the advent calendar.  I finally finished the people and animals . . . well almost finished . . . I still have to do their eyes and add the embellishments . . .

And then I spent a day working on the numbers . . .

I will hopefully get completely finished with it before Christmas, but we're still going to start counting down to Christmas with it . . . even before I get the eyes on the people.
The boys love it.

The boys also love my Snow Village . . . which we started putting out on Friday.  Alex and Shane "helped" me unpack the boxes and set the pieces out.

They spent most of the time setting up "their villages" on different shelves . . . mixing up the people and houses.

But they were having fun and  . . . only one item got knicked while they were playing. . .

That evening I had planned a family movie night with a "Polar Express" theme.  I picked up the movie when I was at Walmart last week and invited my friend Myra and the boys' friend Neal over to watch it with us.

We ate pizza from Mike's and settled down (finally!) to watch the movie.  When the hot chocolate scene happened in the movie . . .

Myra and I served the boys their own mug of hot chocolate with mini marshmallows.

The boys loved it.

And because I wanted to give the boys something special to remember our polar express movie night . . .

I got these bows and bells at the local Dollar store.

I cut the bells off to give each boy his own bell.  I also found some cute ornament initials at the same Dollar store for all 4 boys.

I couldn't find a "Z" for Zach so I had to turn a "N" sideways and make it work for an ornament for him.  I simply hot glued a ribbon on the top of the "Z" and removed the ribbon that came on the "N" ornament.

For those of you who have never seen the movie, the bell represents the first gift of Christmas that the boy chose in the movie for Santa to give him.  And the bell still rings for all those who believe . . .   :)  The boys loved their bells and their Christmas ornaments.

I love the movie.  And my two train-loving boys (Alex and Shane) love the movie too!

And finally . . . My sweet friend, Myra, made this wonderful Christmas painting for me and my family . . .

I love it!  Now I have to find the perfect place to hang it! 

So here's to a lovely and merry Christmas season here at the Ferrell Farm with

                            the Ferrell boys and me!