Santa's Coming Again!

We had another round of snow today in Dallas and as Ella caught a glimpse of it she said "Mom, Santa's going to come again tonight! We've got to hurry and get ready for him! It's Christmas Eve again Mom!" I had to smile since when it snowed in Amarillo on Christmas Eve, Santa did come a few hours later. I had to disappoint her and tell her that we've got another 12 months to wait for Santa. Ella quickly responded with "How many more days until Valentines Day?" We're already onto another countdown to a holiday!

Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let is Snow!

We got a lot of snow on Christmas Eve in Amarillo but the winds were so strong, the kids didn't last too long out in it that day. The day after Christmas the sun was shining and it was a perfect day to get out and have some fun in it. We had snow ball fights and let the kids enjoy the winter wonderland! Mimi and Papa J and all the grandkids

The grandkids from oldest to youngest.

My little snowbunnies swinging!

Ella getting a snowball in the head from Wyatt!

Merry Christmas!!

We had a wonderful Christmas day with the girls getting to enjoy Santa's arrival, playing for hours with their toys and enjoying a great Christmas dinner with my sister's family and my parents. What a precious day as we celebrate the birth of Jesus and are reminded by the incredible gift that was given to each of us!

Ella running in to see what Santa brought her!

Checking out Strawberry Shortcake's Berry Cafe--just what she had told Santa she wanted!

Audrey's new Cinderella baby doll

Audrey got the pink tutu from her cousins and wanted to wear it while she opened her presents!

Advent Day 24: Make Cookies for Santa

Per our usual Christmas Eve tradition, the kids made cookies earlier in the day and then decorated them with lots of icing and candy before setting them out on the fireplace for Santa. Based on the amount of sugar on them, Santa had plenty of energy to make it to everyone's house that night! The kids are also wearing their Christmas pajamas they got to open that night!

Advent Day 23: Make Placecards for Christmas Dinner

I used my extra hands to help make the placecards for Christmas dinner. I had a done a little rendition of these at Thanksgiving, but the kids had fun making theirselves into very colorful snowmen, glueing on buttons and picking out the scarves they wanted to wear. Here's the whole family!

Advent Day 22: Celebrate Wyatt's Birthday

Though it is not really a Christmas activity, the 22nd will always be my first nephew's birthday so it will always be our "activity" for the day! As we headed up to Amarillo today to celebrate his 4th birthday, I remembered exactly 4 years ago, John and I were making the same drive at the same time of day, with a little 2 month old named Ella snuggled in the back seat. We made it to the hospital in time for his arrival which turned quickly scary as he spent his first week in the NICU. You would never know now that his start was a little rocky. He is an energetic, hilarious, ALL-boy little guy who loves Shelby Mustangs and superheroes. I just love him to death and am so grateful that Ella has such a fun cousin right at her age to play with (and get into trouble with!) His birthday party was a superhero theme, so I made the girls into "Super-Princesses" with little shirts and tutu's. They had a blast and looked pretty darn cute too!

Super Princess Ella and Batman Wyatt

Ella, Audrey, Jessica and Wyatt

Advent Day 21: Watch a Christmas Classic

Now, I'm all up for watching Christmas Vacation and of course my new holiday favorite Elf, but I still love the old Christmas movies (if you can call a 20 minute show a movie) that I grew up eagerly anticipating when I was little. Last year, my parents gave us The Original Christmas Classics set that has seven movies including Frosty the Snowman, Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer, etc. The girls have enjoyed watching them this year again and I have to take time to sit down and watch them too!

Advent Day 20: Check out some great Christmas lights

The girls LOVE getting in the car at night after they've had their baths and gotten their pajamas on and driving around to look at Christmas lights. Audrey loves anything with Mickey Mouse or Frosty and Ella is really in to this one particular inflatable that has Santa sitting around the campfire with his reindeer making smores. Tonight we decided to make the drive to Frisco and go through downtown where they REALLY decorate the shops. The lights are synchronized to a radio station so as you drive in your car and listen to Christmas carols, the lights are flashing along with the beat.

Advent Day 19: Celebrate Christmas with Friends

Since we don't have any family close by, our friends here really have become like family to us over the years. We got a chance throughout December to visit with several friends but today we were able to have a yummy Christmas brunch hosted by some of our closest and most fun friends and that evening we had a kids Christmas party at our house. The food, activities, and entertainment was completely geared toward the kids...parents just were the extra! :) We are so grateful for these friendships and for the chance to celebrate with them!

Advent Day 18: Go see the Holiday Trail of Lights at the Heard Museum

It was a chilly night, but we bundled up the girls and headed out to the Heard Museum where they were having their Trail of Lights. They had some of the dinosaurs dressed in their Santa hats and had hay rides if you wanted to wait it line. However, the girls loved watching the different groups who were there singing in the amphitheater. Our church choir performed so it was nice to see some friends while enjoying the sounds of the season!

Audrey couldn't manage to use her hands with her gloves on, so Ella fed her!

Advent Day 17: Have a Happy Birthday Jesus Party!

Today at Ella's preschool, Audrey and I were able to go and attend Christmas chapel with her before we headed to have a Happy Birthday Jesus party with her class. I loved being able to go with Ella to chapel and listen to her sing and dance to all the songs I hear her sing at home. I'm so proud of her!

The party was a blast for the kids! We read the Christmas story, played with Nativity stickers, made ornaments, decorated upside down ice cream cones like Christmas trees and played "Pin Baby Jesus in the Manger." Another fun way to celebrate the holidays and remind the kids why we get to celebrate Christmas!

Ella pinning Baby Jesus in the manger--she was one of the few kids who was willing to wear a blindfold!

Since I'm the room mom, I got enough for Audrey to do the activities too--she definitely thinks she is one of the big kids!

Advent Day 16: Make Gingerbread Houses with Friends

Today one of my sweet friends boldly invited about 7 moms and all their kids over to her house for a Gingerbread House party. I'm sure she'll be picking up pieces of candy all over her floor for the next few weeks! Everyone brought their own kits and the kids had so much fun putting the house together and eating the candy while they decorated it! I think it turned out pretty cute and I decided it was a perfect centerpiece for the dining room table during the holidays. Ella and Audrey both love it out also since it serves as a nice snack for them when they sneak in to pick off a piece!

Advent Day 15: Make Smores and enjoy them under the Christmas Tree

What can be more delicious than a combination of graham crackers, chocolate bar and marshmallows? The girls had fun enjoying the afternoon snack!

And this is what you get when you give this gooey mess to a little one! Yummy!

Advent Day 14: Christmas Cottonball Fun!

What fun you can have with a 99 cent bag of cottonballs!!

Advent Day 13: Visit Santa's Village

It wasn't too cold today so we bundled the kids up and headed to Santa's Village in Richardson. This is our second year to go and Ella really had a blast this year. Despite some crowds, we had fun exploring all the little houses, listening to Christmas music and admiring the lights! I wish it looked like Christmas all year long!!

Here are the girls getting pulled on a reindeer ride. I think Audrey was a little nervous being pulled away by strange teenage boys!

It doesn't matter what princess you are, as long as you have a big dress, crown and wand, Ella adores you. This was the Snow Fairy princess from the Nutcracker. We've got to get Ella to Disneyworld soon!
And yes, that is really Mrs. Claus and she made all those delicious butter cookies in the blue tin. I love the admiration in Ella's eyes!

Shockingly, Ella ran up to Frosty for a picture. She loved him!

Our little red-nosed reindeers!

Advent Day 12: Make a Rice Krispie Christmas House

With Daddy home today, the girls had fun making Rice Krispie Christmas houses with him. The best part--licking the extra off your hands!

Advent Day 11: Wrap Christmas presents

We took a little breather today and just wrapped a few presents to put under the tree. It is so hard for the girls to understand that they can't unwrap everything right now...and that all of the presents are not for them!

Advent Day 10: Go see a live Nativity

This is one of the activities that I was most looking forward to doing! We headed to First Baptist McKinney for The Christmas Journey. It was really a neat experience as we drove through (in the warmth of our car) scenes from the birth of Jesus through the resurrection. The girls enjoyed seeing all the live animals and munching on popcorn we had brought for the ride! We were so proud of Ella telling us all by herself about who people were and what was going on in the scenes! It is a great activity to do with your family as a reminder of the purpose of this season! It is only on for this weekend, so you have to hurry!

I don't think you can ever see this scene and not feel so extremely blessed by what God did for us.

Advent Day 9: Make and Decorate Salt Dough Ornaments

Anything that results in a making a mess in the kitchen is my girls' idea of a fun time. Today we made salt dough ornaments for the tree and then after they cooled the girls got to paint them. Lots of fun and something we can hang on the tree to look back on this year! It did take a while for Audrey to realize that they weren't sugar cookies--I think she licked every one before she started painting!!

Advent Day 8: Write Letters to Santa

Ella was very in to this activity! While Audrey was napping, Ella and I looked through pictures to find the things she wanted for Christmas. I wrote out the letter to Santa exactly from her words. At least Ella was honest about her behavior! Oh, and "Hudson" is our name for the Elf on the Shelf at our house. Ella is very concerned about him reporting all her bad behavior to Santa! Ella also told me what to write for Audrey...so cute!!

Advent Day 7: Make Christmas Cards.

These stencil cards from Usborne are so fun and cute! Very inexpensive, the girls had a blast making Christmas cards today with them!

Advent Day 6: Buy Christmas gifts to donate

Despite the fun of Santa, Rudolph and presents, we want to make sure our kids never overshadow the fact that Christmas is about Jesus and celebrating his birth. We want to try to remind them that we are so blessed and there are so many people and so many little kids who don't have very much. We brought the girls to Target to pick out gifts to donate to Toys for Tots, a wonderful organization that makes giving so easy. The girls picked out a baby doll, an Ariel princess, Candy Lane, and Chutes and Ladders. Hopefully some child's Christmas morning will be a little brighter this year!

Advent Day 5: Put up the Outside Lights

After seeing a lot of other people with their outside lights out already, the girls were ready for our yard to be a winter wonderland too. It was freezing today, but we bundled up Ella during naptime, put our reindeer antlers on, and put her to work! Both girls LOVE to drive around at night and check out the Christmas lights. It is our new family entertainment...got to love that it is free!

Happy Birthday Madelyn

Ella's absolute best friend in the whole world, Madelyn, celebrated her 4th birthday today. Her mom did the most precious girls birthday party I've ever seen. It was in tea party fashion and the girls got to make their own hats, had feather boas, white gloves, necklaces and rings to wear. They were so cute. They ate off of little plates and sipped tea out of tiny tea cups. It was so cute! Right after Ella said she wanted to have the same party next year!

Ella all dolled up! The girls were SOOO cute!

Advent Day 4: Make Jingle Bell Bracelets

The girls love to play with beads and throwing a little noise maker on it makes it even better! They both opted for bracelets and necklaces...we are jingling our way to Christmas!!

Advent Day 3: Decorate the tree with candy canes and paper chains.

We celebrated day 3 by making paper chains to hang on the girls trees along with decorating them with a box of candy canes. I don't have any pictures of this, primarily because Audrey tried to eat through the plastic wrap of all the candy canes. So, we've had to remove candy canes from the trees. Little Audrey...even plastic wrapping can't stop her!

Advant Day 2: Go to Northpark to see the Trains and Santa!

With a bit of snow on the ground this morning, we packed up and headed to Northpark to meet my good friend Beth and her kids Will and Lauren and to visit Santa. This Santa has been at this location for about 30 years and he is the real deal. He is so sweet with the kids and very patient with the crybabies!! We got there early to get our number for pictures, listened to Santa's storytime, went to check out the train exhibit and then headed back for pictures. Ella was especially excited to tell him everything she wanted for Christmas and Audrey seemed excited too until it was our turn. As you can see, Audrey wanted nothing to do with him!

Audrey calmed down just a little bit.


Audrey kept looking at him wondering what in the world she was doing on his lap!

Ella filling Santa in on her ever-expanding list!

Audrey and Lauren checking out the trains.