Getting Ready for Christmas

Having little ones around is making this Christmas season very merry!

On our first December weekend, we (Chris) cut down our Christmas tree at the Christmas Tree Farm. The girls had a blast running around among the trees--and a bit scary for parents when those short ones would disappear in the forest. We had always gone to Home Depot for a tree before, so this was a fun first for all of us.

I tried to get the the girls to help decorate the tree, but they were having dexterity problems. Addisyn could get ornaments on once I showed her how to hold them; she put about 5 of them all in one spot and hung them on the lights wire, so I had to rearrange them. Piper can hang candy canes on the garland.

Piper has a blast clicking the lights on and off on the tree with the button switch. It's so cute to watch her run over to her spot at the corner of the fireplace and sit straight-legged with the button in her lap-- click on, click off, click on, click off, click on, click off, click on, click off...

The are both in awe over all the lights in our front yard and in the neighborhood. Piper, who can now put a few words together, says. "I see lights." It is so adorable. A lot of houses in our neighborhood are lit up, so we point them out in the car at night.

Until this week, December has brought us warm sunshine. Addisyn enjoyed "naptime" outdoors a couple times. (For our family in the north east weather, we added the sunglasses for the picture for greater effect :-) Addisyn doesn't actually sleep in the afternoons anymore, but I still (usually unsuccessfully without TV) try to get her to rest and be quiet so Piper can sleep, so thus we went outside.


I've enjoyed watching the girls play well together. (Santa's watching.)

Chris took this next picture--he thought it was HILARIOUS how both girls RAN for their vacuums when I had to clean up after dinner. We will inspire this type of help for as long as we can!


Today's surprise was an early Christmas present! Smiles were ear to ear! Grandma Joyce and Papa Dave set up a bounce house in their living room! Playtime was indoors due to the downpours of rain today. I took the girls over there today so I could go make Christmas cookies with my sisters. Addisyn and Piper were thrilled jumping and bouncing and sliding.

Marcy and Stacy baked for 2 days, me only 1 (too sick to participate yesterday). All in all, there were 688 cookies, plus fudge, "brookie," truffles, and rice crispie treats. We finally finished cleaning Stacy's kitchen at 10pm.

My final thought for the end of this blog... If anyone wants to make a Christmas wish, wish for snow in San Diego. Addisyn thinks it's going to SNOW on Christmas day. All the Christmas books and TV shows have snow, so it's a reasonable conclusion for a 3 yr old. I had to break the news to her today (I don't want her to be disappointed on Christmas day)--I told her it would snow in the mountains and where Cousin Erika lives, and at the North Pole; and that we can go look for snow sometime after Christmas. She wants to make snow angels, and "a daddy snowman and a mommy snowman and an Addisyn snowman and a Piper snowman."