Festivities...

Just wanted to throw up a few of the Christmas festivities so far.
This is the Nativity Play our preschool did for a care center nearby. I wish I had more pictures, it was very nice. The kids sang 4 songs, did the play, and gave cards to each of the residents. All of the residents were in wheel chairs, so it was a little hard to have the kids getting too close, but I think it was a really good experience for them all. They sang SO quietly though, I tried so hard to get them to sing out, haha, oh well.

A trip to Harmon's Tree Farm to find...out that their trees are too expensive for us. :) I'm used to paying like $15 or so for a tree, $50 is just too much. We didn't stay at the farm long and just drove down the street to Lowes to find our $20 tree. The tree is kind of dry already, major shape issues (must have been bundled for awhile), but it was only $20 and is all just the same to the kids. We decided to start the 'tradition' of having a sleepover under the tree after it's decorated. The kids loved it-- but seems to have started the trend of staying up late every night since.



This year, the kids made christmas aprons at a playgroup early December. I thought they were so cute, and festive to help mom make the big batches of cookies to give away. They had a lot of fun making these sugar dipped cookies.


The Christmas Cafe! While the aprons were donned and the kids in the mood, I decided to turn dinner that night into a night at the Christmas cafe. The kids and I made menus that had secret code words for the dinner items. It was a fun trick to play on Dad, and the kids were a hoot acting as our waiter and waitress. The kids especially liked the Golden Snowflakes, made from a round of fresh pineapple. (yum, I love fresh pineapple!)

Turkey Rewind

We got to get Thanksgiving up here before Christmas comes!! (Wait, did I even get Halloween up? That's the way these things go I guess!) We were so lucky and happy to a visitor for Thanksgiving. Kids love the extra attention, of course, and we're really looking forward to seeing Grandma. Lucy still prays almost everyday that "cousins" or "grandma" or someone will be coming on the airplane to South Carolina. ah me, little girl. Anyway, Grandma flew in and we drove the 1.5 hrs to go get her, but of course I decided to make a whole day of it. We started early in the morning with a sack lunch and visited to a gold mine just outside of Charlotte, NC. We joined the little tour and spent quite a lot of time there, in fact, we were "late" heading to the $2 movie, which was next on my agenda. We still went in to kill the next hour watching Despicable Me. The kids liked it, although it was in 3D and Lucy didn't want to keep her glasses on. Willie was fine with having glasses, cute little smiling cheeks underneath. :)


We picked up Grandma Connie amongst mad busy traffic- biggest travel day of the year. We also had a nice Thanksgiving visit. I can't remember now why I was particuarly busy at that time, but I remember not having anything planned for dinner. I did have a turkey thawed, but that was it. Grandma helped really pull the dinner together. Our visit also included a trip to the children's museum to see their new exhibits- Fairytale land and Snowville.