The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

The kids and I went the mall on Monday to visit Santa. The kids loved sitting on his lap and M eagerly told him he wanted a truck. D was a little too shy to talk to him, but that smart Santa knew she was asking for a doll. We splurged and did the train ride through the mall after getting some last minute shopping done.



Dancer and Prancer helped me deliver some Christmas cards and goodies to our neighbors on Tuesday. It was so nice to get outside for a little bit. One of our neighbors had a large Christmas village set up in their house. The kids were just entranced by it and loved watching the moving parts, seeing the lights, and pointing out all the figures and details on the houses.





Christmas Eve! What a beautiful, snowy day to spend some time outside. The kids were excited to put out some special food for Santa's reindeer.







The kids loved playing and sliding in the snow this morning. Can you believe this is how high the sides of our driveway are filled with snow now?



We had a special treat after Christmas Eve lunch. The kids got to decorate their own cupcake to celebrate Jesus' birthday. The cupcake was different colors to symbolize different things (purity, new life) and had a star on top like the one that shone on Christmas night. The lit candle is for Jesus's light shining in our world. It is fun to start our own traditions as the kids get older.





Another tradition we started this year is fondue on Christmas Eve night. Growing up, we used to do fondue on New Year's Eve as a family. The kids loved "cooking" their own dinner, although they were not fond of the cheese fondue. That was okay with Steve and I, as we gobbled all of it up! Everyone loved the chocolate fondue--I think we'll all be wearing elastic pants for the next week.



The kids in front of our tree.



Stiehl Productions also put on plays telling the Christmas story several nights this Christmas season. The kids really got into it and D knew all of her lines with Steve barely even having to prompt her--she always wanted us to read the Christmas story to her before going to bed. Here is Mary hearing a message from the angel Gabriel.



Mary and Joseph had no luck finding room at the inn.



Here an angel of the Lord tells the shepherds the Good News.



The three kings visited baby Jesus and gave special gifts to him.



We opened some gifts from Steve's family Christmas Eve evening. Here are D and M with Popeye and Olive Oyl from Grandma and Papa.



Christmas morning!



D was so excited to get Belle.



The cousins have now taken over our traditional family picture in front of the fireplace.



Taking turns opening gifts. That is true patience!





Merry Christmas!

Ugh

If you think that looks like a hole in our door, you're absolutely right. We got locked out of our house thanks to our mailman (who opened our door to put a package in our garage--why, I'm not sure--and set off our alarm) and the police (who came to check on our house and then proceeded to lock our door going from inside the garage to the inside of our house). Neither of us had a key, a locksmith was going to cost about as much as a new door, plus would be a minimum of 2 1/2 hours. Did I mention the temperature was about 15 degrees outside?

We went out to get something to eat and after exhausting all other possibilities (that credit card trick doesn't work by the way!), Steve decided to take out the ol' chainsaw and make a hole in the door so we could get in. I did want to replace that door eventually, eventually being the key word there. Doing it in below freezing weather doesn't sound like too much fun. Hopefully the 3M plastic will keep out the cold until we can get a new door!

Spritz Cookie Making

D and M love trains. Here they made one out of their toys and some buckets. Then each "conductor" got to drive his/her own train.



My sillies. They took all the toys out of their toy "boxes" so they could hide in them.



Yummm....delicious blue ring pop.



Cute pose in front of the Christmas tree.



My mom and dad and my sister's family came up on Sunday to do our traditional making, decorating, and baking of spritz Christmas cookies. The cousins had so much fun getting into the decorating and pumping out of the cookies. The spritz makers worked so good this year--the best I can ever remember in the history of spritz cookie making!











Cousin hogpile!



Cute cousins.