Christmas fun…continued

Here is a picture run down of the rest of our Christmas festivities
painting Christmas ornaments


puzzle time! (another one of our favorite holiday traditions)

Kate (NOT singing) at her Christmas Eve church program


Pics from our annual Christmas Eve party and auction at the in-laws. We had a table full of yummy eats, followed by the grandkids setting up the nativity with Gma and then gathering around while Gpa read the  Christmas story from Luke 2.This year for the auction, Grandpa was “Magnif the Magician” and Eric was his trusty sidekick (“MA” the magic helper). Some of the mystery gifts this year… the “magic spell” which was a spelling book….and “black magic” which was a large box with a big assortment of black candies (black licorice, crows, etc). Haha…he has such a sense of humor! We love ya Dad/Gpa. Thanks for all the fun. We appreciate all you do. What wonderful memories we take from these special nights!

Setting out cookies and milk for Santa and reading Polar Express with Daddy

Christmas morning! Santa brought Kate a “cookin” and Charlotte a ball popper toy. It was a great morning…although I woke up sicker than I had been all week. Ohhh…being sick on Christmas is miserable! After opening presents, we headed to my Mom’s for brunch (I told her I would stay at home and just send my family…but she wanted me anyway…sickness and all. You have to love Moms. They just want to take care of you no matter what. Thanks mom. I love you so much. And THANK you for the delicious brunch (seriously..the food was amazing) and beautiful table setting! It was all wonderful! Wish I would have been better company. Kate was so excited to come to your house and has not stopped playing with her animal figurines since! What a lucky girl she is to have such a wonderful Nanny!
Then we headed home and relaxed the rest of the day (got some much needed sleep) and spent lots of time with Kate..playing with all her new toys. She especially loved playing UNO moo and Elefun!
Charlotte was completely intrigued by the Mickey ferris wheel
 
Our Journey to Bethlehem Advent Calendar. Eric’s Mom made it for us. It’s identical to the one she had for them when they were young. What an amazing and TOUCHING gift. I know hours upon hours of sewing went into this, Truly a gift of love. I always loved this one at his parents, so I almost started crying when she gave it to us. We can’t tell you Momma Maz how much this gift means to us. We will cherish it always.  Kate loved moving the Mary and Joseph each day and was soooo excited when we got to add the baby Jesus to the manger on Christmas day. It will be such a special  tradition for our family. Eric has such fond memories of this advent calendar from when he was young, so we are so happy to carry on the tradition with our girls. Thank you, Thank you..again. This gift means more to us than you will ever know!

Miss Charlotte enjoying her first taste of baby cereal. She kept trying to suck the spoon..it was hilarious.


The TWO puzzles we did Christmas weekend.. With me being sick…we spent lots of family time at home..which was nice. Kate loved helping with the puzzles too. None of the pieces she put together actually went together….but she kept getting large squares of mismatched pieces together. She felt like she was contributing to the puzzle with mom and dad, and was quite proud of herself…it was soo cute.

Well…that’s it folks. Merry Christmas from our home to yours! And may your New Year be filled with health, love and happiness. 

Plenty of Christmas fun....

followed by nasty yucky colds! Following our last several weeks of holiday fun...Charlotte and I both got sick (And then Kate too). And not just a light cold,  but fierce..wanna stay in bed...kinda colds. And right before Christmas too. Ugg. Soo many of the activities I had planned and last minute shopping had to be canceled . I had really wanted to take Kate to the rest of our favorite annual places...(especially Candlelight Christmas) but they will have to wait until next year. Sorry sweetie. At least we got plenty of fun squeezed in before momma got sick.

I was going to do seperate posts for all this stuff....but with lack of time and energy...heres a bunch of our recent holiday fun.

Charlotte turned 4 months (actually is now 4 1/2 months)! She is growing so fast. Too fast. I want time to go slower. Im not ready to have her so grown up. The pediatrican said its time to start baby cereal. With Kate I couldn't wait...but now it just makes me realize how FAST the time is going and I just want to freeze time. Charlotte had a perfect 4 month check up and is even around the 50% for weight!! Kate was rarely on the charts (usually about 3%). Charlotte weighed 12.9 lbs. and was 24 inches long (50%). She is a growin girl..with chubby thighs and all (I LOVE it). She is very active now...always wanting to play...or chew on something. A bib has become a permanent accesory to her outfits. She is such a drooler (just like Kate). She can roll over and loves to talk to anyone who will listen. She is such a good baby..always full of smiles and rarely crys. We love her to pieces. Just in the last week  she has started having playtime in her doorway jumper and activity saucer. She loves them. Especially the saucer! She is already figuring out how to make all the toys on it work. And yesterday...we started baby cereal. She likes it but keeps trying to suck the spoon like a bottle. She hasen't quite mastered the concept yet...but at least she seems interested. I remember Kate made the the most horrified face when we tried to feed her rice cereal...but Charlotte just gobbled it down!

A little Christmas craftin'...Kate LOVED, LOVED making this....took us about 2 hours..but it was well worth our effort. She has had so much fun with it.

Ever tried playing with bubbles in the winter???? You SHOULD!! They don't pop...they just sit in perfect form on the frozen ground. It's amazing!! This discovery came when Eric was cleaning out our bubble machine after I had showed it to my friend Kate and her little guy Aldon. Her little babe likes bubbles..so I got ours out to show her. I didn't think it had any bubbles in it, so when my Kate turned it on..I didn't think twice. I continued chatting and after a couple minutes, I happened to look up and my living room was FULL of bubbles....all the way up to the top of my 20 ft vaulted ceiling! Haha..we all got a good laugh. And the babies were mesmorized (And my Kate thought it was the most fantastic fun ever)! This also led to another discovery....Bubbles look amazing by the light of a Christmas tree! You must try it if your tree is still up.

Christmas dinner with friends

Even the kiddies joined us after dinner. They had a blast...chowing candy and running wild

then snuggied in for Mickey's Christmas Carol

My favorite Chrismas package

Breaking out our puzzle board for a Sunday night puzzle night...with a fire and hot cocoa. We started with some Kate friendly puzzles. She suprised both Eric and I at how well she could put them together.

Christmas baking with Nanny. We made our annual Christmas goodies...swedish flatbread and spritz! Yum, Yum! My mom even had a little baking outfit for Kate...so cute! Thanks mom. We loved spending the day with you

Enjoying our annual trip to Zoolights! We always let Kate pick out an ornament for our tree. This year she picked a mini snow globe ornament with a snow tiger in it. Good choice sweetie! It looks lovely on our tree!

Playdate with their friend Harlow

First visit with Santa. All the kids waited until they were called up by name to visit with Santa. As soon as she heard Santa say her name...Kate shot up..ran to Santa and jumped up on his lap, and gave him a big hug. I was shocked!!! I thought she might be a little timid...but no sir! She told Santa she wanted an Ariel dress, and a cookin' (meaning a Kitchen..with stuff to cook with). She must have been a good girl, because Santa just happened to have an Ariel dress for her in his toy sack : )

Second visit with Santa (At the mall this time). She loved him just as much the second time around. As we walked away, she said "Mom..Santa is sooo nice!"

Random pic of our little sweetie enjoying her toys

Christmas party sleepover! Kate's first official sleepover. We had my cousins girls over for some festive fun and a slumber party! It was a blast. The festivities included...pizza, christmas crafts (necklaces, paperbag reindeer, reindeer food), caroling, warming up with hot cocoa (with snowman shaped marshmellows) and Christmas stories by the fire, Christmas movie and.... lots of giggling at bedtime. I finally had to seperate Kate and Leiya until they fell asleep. And all three of them had their princess dresses on bright and early. But whats a slumber party without lots of girly time fun!

More to come soon on the rest of our Christmas adventures.....this was all our fun..prior to me getting SICK!