Saturday, December 29, 2012

Water Colors!

 For Christmas we got Alison some water colors, brushes and water color paper. I thought it would be something fun we could all do together no matter what the weather was outside.
A little yellow...
 
A little red...

A little more red..

I loved watching Alison concentrate on what she was painting.

Chris working on a batman symbol along side his little girl. She seemed to really like that mommy and daddy were painting with her.

And finally a little blue!

Friday, December 28, 2012

Baby Sitting

My friend Kerry needed to take her eldest daughter to the dentist so I offered to watch her youngest, Megyn. Alison was excited to have her friend over and apparently also excited to give her friend's baby doll some love.

My pretty little girl.


Tuesday, December 25, 2012

Merry Christmas!


Merry Christmas!
Alison enjoyed opening her presents!

 
Chris gave me a beautiful mother necklace!

Alison wanted to wear her "Alison Clause" outfit (she came up with the name by the way)
She was very excited to get a chocolate Santa.

Our good friends Mike and Rhonda came over for Christmas dinner

What a good looking group of people!
I wish my table was this full of people more often!!

"God bless us, every one."

Monday, December 24, 2012

Twas the Night before Christmas....

Our Christmas tree was a bit too small to serve as the shelter for our gifts so our couch had to do.
Alison is interested in opening presents this year so we had to put the gifts up to keep her from getting into them.
Alison's Santa gifts. She told me that she wanted Santa to bring her chocolate.
Santa brought her a few other little things as well!

I bought us all matching shoes for Christmas. They are really comfortable, like a house shoe you can wear outside.



Ethan sleeping

The final door of Alison's Advent calendar

The final door of Ethan's Advent Calendar

"A Merry Christmas to all! And to all a good night!"

Sunday, December 23, 2012

Alison Clause

Daddy found Alison a pretty Christmas outfit and Alison is nuts over it!
Here she is as we wait on the first floor of our apartment building for daddy, Ethan and our friend Josaline and her family. We wanted to visit her church to check it out. Josaline is one of my mommy friends who has a baby daughter named Avery.
I love fixing Alison' hair it always looks so cute, but it never seems to last! Alison loves pulling the rubber bands out!

Alison and her doll May. I have started having Alison carry her own bag with some snacks and books in it when we go to church. (Makes my diaper bag a little lighter and she seems to like it.

Thursday, December 20, 2012

One Car

I don't know if I've mentioned it but we have only one car that works. 
So if I need to do anything (like doctors appointments) and Chris can't come along we all have to get up at 4 in the morning and take daddy to work, not so fun. But Alison really likes picking daddy up.
Here she is watching the stairs waiting for daddy to come out of his office.

And here he comes!
we drove home and Alison wanted to play on the playground for a bit in her new rain coat that Grandpa Gary and Grammy sent.

Alison is getting braver and braver on the playground. She is climbing up the ladder...

And going down the slide! 
This is her first time going down the slide all by herself at our building's playground!!

Wednesday, December 19, 2012

Mommy Friends Christmas Party

 
Avera, Audrey, Ethan, and Payton (who appears to be rolling his eyes at the ridiculous amount of picture taking that went on hee hee)
What Happens when you have a party with mom's and babies?
LOTS of pictures of the babies together!

 
Of course occasionally the mommies had to reach in and sooth the babies
.......wait that's not Ethan's mom......(best big sister ever huh?)


 Ethan- "Dude, they're still taking pictures"
Payton- "I know right?" *eye roll* 



 My handsome boy

 
Alison wanted to be in a picture too. My how she has grown in only 3 short years!
According to this picture she is easily 8 feet tall! 

Payton- "Boys rule!"

 Payton and his pretty mommy Crystal

 Meredith & Ethan
Kayla & Audrey
Josaline & Avery

We had a wonderful time. It's always fun to get together with other moms and hang out.









Tuesday, December 18, 2012

"Oh Christmas Branch, Oh Christmas Branch, Your Leaves are so Unchanging!"


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My dear sweet boy napping away while I make cookies for a very small mommies of newborns Christmas party/cookie and gift exchange.
 
These might be the best cookies ever. 
I did change up the recipe a little, I used more white chocolate chips, omitted the mint chocolate bits and added the candy cane bits to the batter....wish I would have taken a better picture as these cookies are very pretty and festive! I separated them into bags for our cookie exchange, because when you have a baby sometimes all you can manage to do is grab a bag! 

Chris brought home a surprise! a wonderful care package!
Thank you! Chris was very excited about the Louisville shirts!

Ethan seemed to really like them too!

TA-DA!
 Alison REALLY wanted a Christmas tree and while we were out walking she saw a bush with lots of little Christmas trees on it and pointed it out to me. She picked out her favorite, mommy plucked it off the bush, and Ali carried it all the way home!
She was very excited to wake up after her nap to see that mommy had decorated it. 
One of her books is Tomtem and the fox and it takes place around Christmas so I used her Tomtem and fox toys as decorations, deconstructed cotton balls for snow, her baby doll as a baby Jesus, white yarn and a paper star for the tree and of course the other little treasures we found on our walk, a smooth stick and a little rock.
This might go down as one of my most favorite Christmas trees.

Ethan likes it too ;)

Thursday, December 13, 2012

St. Lucia Day


I called one of my church friends, Laura, last night and asked her if she would like a very small Saint Lucia to deliver her some saffron buns. Of course she said that she would love it.
Alison and I prepared a tray to take to her and a nice mug of hot tea.
Traditionally, the oldest daughter would dress in a white dress with a red sash, white for Saint Lucia's purity and the red because she is a martyr.
We didn't have a white dress so we used a white and red playsilk instead :)
also the daughter normally wears a crown of candles...maybe next year, this year Alison got to carry her light as a wooden star in a heart on her tray.

Alison delivering her buns to Ms. Laura (who lives a quick elevator ride upstairs) 
We stayed and chatted for a bit and talked about Saint Lucia, Laura told us about how they celebrated Saint Lucia in Italy. Her and her husband were lucky enough to be stationed in Italy for a few years.

Happy Saint Lucia Day!
We had a lovely morning and I am looking forward to doing it again next year!






Wednesday, December 12, 2012

Lussekatt


 
All the ingredients ready to make some "lussekatt" or simply saffron buns for Saint Lucia day!
See my little late night helper? Ethan loves sitting in the high chair and watching me work in the kitchen, what a good son.
Last year I really wanted to make a batch of these buns but it didn't end up happening so I was determined to make them this year! Saint Lucia Day is one of the many holidays celebrated in the Waldorf school and one I have enjoyed adding to our list of celebrated holidays. 

 
The saffron
 
The saffron makes the dough so yellow and pretty!
I can understand how such a sunny yellow bun would be used to celebrate a Saint who brings light (Saint Lucia is the one who has the wreath of candles on her head) 

The dough.
This is my first time making these so at this point I am really hoping they turn out!
The dough itself was velvety smooth, it was really a nice texture to work with.


I rolled the dough into long strips and curled them
 
On the cooling rack!
These little guys took awhile to make but were worth it. 
A wonderful treat to have with tea.
If Alison was older she would have made these and served them to us in the morning. But since she is a bit young mommy will be helping her :) Maybe next year, can hardly believe that she will be 4 next year! My my how the time flies!