We had a fun and festive Christmas season. We read books, made cookies, wrote letters to Santa, went sledding and celebrated Christmas in our new house - complete with "guests" (aka family)!
One of our most recent genius ideas was to have Claire make recordable books to give to the Grandparents and Great Grandparents. She more or less just talked about what was going on on that page - with a little prompting. In Nonnie and Papa's book, we got her to sing "Oh the Lord is good to me" and say her good night prayer.
We are lucky enough to live right next to Countryside School - and their fantastic playgrounds with a sledding hill. I love kids in snow gear :)
Walking to the sledding hill with daddy. The little hill - where we sled - is by the trees. The big hill (up by the school) will be great in a few years.
Recordable book #2
You can't have Christmas without frosted cookies! Uncle Mitchy and Kalin helped us - which is good because Kalin makes a mean cookie dough!
I realize I was playing with fire by putting out my Christmas village and figurings - fragile figurines. Claire was gentle with them, for the most part. However, I did need to superglue at least 4 items, 2 of them twice.
Here is Claire with one of her victims. Something about how they are sisters and love each other...
...still happy...
...oops...one hit the ground. Don't worry, mommy (and super glue) to the rescue!
At least 2 1/2 year olds recover quickly! Good thing too - we needed this one for our Christmas card.
Recordable book #3 - Princesses (for Grammy and Pop Pop).
And no holiday season would be complete without fancy nails. I usually do Claire's nails, but now that she is a "big girl", she decided she was capable of painting her own nails - as well as mine.
She made sure to blow on my toes to dry the paint.
Finished! Not half bad!
From this distance, they look decent. (What you don't see is me removing 1/2 the paint from the skin around my toes).
Once we had our nails set, we needed to make sure the bathroom was clean for Nonnie and Papa's visit. (We have many more photos and video, however I didn't think they were appropriate for the internet).
Ryan and Papa went to church early to get a spot, while the girls prettied themselves for the evening. Claire hadn't been a fan of tights (covering her toes), so I did't buy any. Of course, on Christmas Eve, she wanted to wear them. So I stuffed her into 12-mo black tights. She didn't complain!
Just as we were ready to leave, Claire had to go to the bathroom. This is a 10-minute ordeal that involves completely undressing. So, we undressed, she did her business, then we redressed.
Once she was dressed and ready to go, Mommy thought she was too cute for words and needed a photo.
By the time we got to church, Papa and Daddy were the last ones (in the entire place) saving seats. There may have been a text or two sent our way asking our ETA. Not to worry, we made it in plenty of time :)
After dinner, Nonnie and Claire wrote a letter to Santa and put out milk, cookies and a carrot for our night visitors.
Dear Santa, Please leave a present for Claire, Mommy, Daddy, Papa, Nonnie and Spencer. I will leave good cookies. I will leave a carrot for Rudolph. Love Claire (spelled FeVCo).
Christmas Day
Our tree was a bit ridiculous - stuffed with presents from Santa, Nonnie, Papa, Mommy, Daddy, Grammy, Pop Pop, the Stelljes family and Auntie Louise and Uncle Bill! Phew, that's a mouthful!
1st Christmas in our house :) First we head to the family room to see if Santa got his note (and ate his cookies). My favorite part (at about 1:30) is when Claire sees all the gifts under the tree :)
Claire made sure to be available in case anyone needed help opening their gifts.
Woop woop! (or woop wool for those of you who speak the Edina dialect of Minnesotan). Mommy got an I-phone!!
Papa made sure to have his headlamp on for this next gift.
This is Claire's present: a recordable book complete with "Oh, the Lord is good to me" and our bedtime prayer.
Presents from DC!
Looking forward to next year!
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