Little stories all thrown together

There is a batch of sugar cookie dough in the fridge cooling so that the girls and I can make cut outs, bake them, and get them all prettied up today  just for fun. I think if it's broken up into mini projects (cut out and bake before nap, icing after naps, eating after supper wink wink) then it won't feel overwhelming and will instead just be a fun memory.

A mama can dream.

All dressed up in their Christmas dresses.

As I cleaned up the kitchen and looked around, I was able to sigh happily because the kitchen is pretty clean. Not like "oh I just cleaned up after making cookie dough" but like "hey I've maintained a general state of cleanliness that is unheard of lately" clean. You know what really sealed the deal? My microwave is still all shiny and clean from wiping it down three separate times this last week. The inside of the microwave that you can't see unless you're using it is what makes me happy.  Anybody else have weird things like that that make them just feel like all is well?

We won't mention those two baskets of clean laundry waiting to be addressed in the laundry room. Out of sight out of mind...

I'm the first to admit that I'm terrible at Christmas crafts. We've done just one this year, consisting of me printing out a few Christmas-y pictures and having the girls color them in only red and green markers. I did it with them and it was really fun, so I thought, Hey! We should do this more often! Well that clearly didn't happen.

Maybe today we'll make sparkly paper snowflakes. How's that for ambitious?

The girls got their hair trimmed a while ago. They did pretty well. Josie was very serious and a little squirmy, but overall it was a success and her hair looks healthy, nice and even.

The baby is coming in six weeks! I haven't done my 33 week update like I did for the other girls, but instead of stressing out about it I'll just do it at 34 weeks. No big deal right? Hey, that is a big deal for me. I'm quite Type A about random things and that happens to be one of them. I've done more updates for this baby than I have for the other girls so I'm giving myself a break. I'm so kind to myself. :)

This was actually taken a different week than the Christmas program, but I didn't get a chance to take a picture that day so it is close enough.

I promised a post about our "Santa's Village" adventure, and then proceeded to lose all of my pictures from that day. So here's the story: We had limited time there and decided to skip the craft making section and start with Santa. The whole day, both girls were pumped to see him. We had talked about it positively and they seemed genuinely excited. We waited in the relatively long line and they both still seemed ready and into it. Then, the kid in front of us lost it. He was little and had probably never done it before so he was screaming and flailing and his parents forced him through it instead of removing him right away. No judgement here, I mean, the screaming child pictures are funny, I get it. But the girls were closely watching and that was it. Josie was pushed by me walked up to him but immediately started screaming and backing up. There was no way to get her up there, the more I tried, the more she backed up. Since I was in the thick of it, there weren't pictures taken anyways. Audrey also was screaming and gripping hubby's neck, so we just called it quits (trying not to laugh at our screaming children) and headed over to Mrs. Clause, who was decorating cookies. We had no problem over there! Poor Santa was such a nice guy and just sat there calmly waiting. I'm sure he's seen in it 1000 times before. 

We also checked out the huge train set (for like 20 minutes...it's a hit every year) and the reindeer. They loved all of it and we still called the day a success. I just don't think we'll ever have those happy "sitting on Santa's lap" pictures. I guess I'm fine with that. This is wayyyy more entertaining.

This was Audrey's first real haircut, up on the little chair booster and everything. She rocked it. She held her head so still and it hardly took any time. She looks much less like a rag doll than she did before. :) (No good "after photos" but it really wasn't all that noticeable anyway.)

We also had the girls' first Christmas program at church. Mad props to the moms that took that on; I don't think I could have handled it. They had two and three year olds in it, which was quite risky since they just don't get it. Both girls just kind of hung out up there on the stage. They were supposed to hold up a letter at the appropriate time. Audrey completely missed her turn and Josie held hers up from her turn until they were escorted off the stage, so basically through 10 more letters besides her own. She was so proud to be holding it up. I hope the other moms didn't mind her blocking their views of their kids while she held it up... because we thought it was adorable. Not biased at all.

No great pictures, but you can see how adorable they looked on stage!

Well, Audrey is holding up her "C" even though it probably wasn't at the right time and only lasted for a few seconds!

Audrey is holding the letter "C" and I believe she had juuuust spotted Daddy at this point. She gave both Mommy and Daddy shout outs through out her time up there. 

Audrey is standing right next to the letter "A" ... totally over stimulated by what is happening around her. She's a "watcher" more than a "doer"

Josie, holding up her "D" way longer than necessary

In the next couple of days, we are going to pick out our yearly ornaments, go to a one year old's birthday party (why are these so fun??), go to a caroling event (I hope it works to go... it sounds almost magical), and then hit the road for all of the Christmas festivities. I just love this season.

What are you doing for Christmas?