Christmas tree

Christmas Photos Take 2

December 28, 2018 by Rebecca Whitehead

Eleanor wasn’t cooperative the Sunday before Christmas, so the Sunday after Christmas, the girls donned their Christmas outfits one more time for their “Christmas Dresses Photos.” When they rolled their eyes, I told them there might be an extra candy cane in it for them and they were suddenly willing to smile for 2.5 minutes.

One mistake was putting shoes on Elle… so alluring!

Oopsy daisy.

Elle was too interested in her shiny moccs to care about pictures.

Oooh sparkles.

Fascinating view!

Lots of love,

Filed Under: Christmas Tagged With: Christmas 2018, Christmas dresses photos 2018, Christmas tree, Eleanor's first Christmas

Christmas Sing Along 2018

December 20, 2018 by Rebecca Whitehead

Eleanor and Meredith clapped along (and in Meredith’s case, sang along) as Samantha and Amelia performed in their school’s annual Christmas Sing Along. The twins abhor crowds and being the center of attention, so since this was their third sing-along, the only thing I wanted them to improve on was not crying in the middle of the performance! Mission accomplished.

There were no tears this year, unlike last time:

Sing-Along 2016:

Sing-Along 2018:

Eleanor was so fascinated, especially by all those jingling jingle bells. Meredith clapped, tapped her jingle bells to the beat and sang her heart out in the audience. It will be fun to have her perform next year!

Kaylee, Amelia and Cooper.

The girls didn’t melt down this time, which is a first. When I asked them in the morning if they were actually going to sing, Amelia replied, “But it’s sooooooo long!” She has a point– the 45 minute performance could easily be cut down to 20 and still be cute!

They know all the Christmas songs/hand actions and sing them LOUDLY at home while running around like maniacs, but during any kind of performance, they are reserved. Their teachers don’t believe me when I tell them what they are like at home, because at school they are so quiet!

Last year, Amelia got overwhelmed toward the end and looked so forlorn!

This time, the girls sang some of the songs and opted out of others. Amelia just stared off into space most of the time– she does not like all the attention! Samantha attempted some of the hand actions and songs she liked.

Staring off into space…

Roly poly Eleanor:

Samantha decided she liked Rudolph well enough to participate for this one.

Lots of love,

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: christmas sing-along 2018, Christmas tree, school Christmas program

Cookie Decorating, Gingerbread Houses, Broken Metatarsals and December 2018

December 7, 2018 by Rebecca Whitehead

At the beginning of December, we asked the girls what their favorite Christmas activities were so that we could make a bucket list. Instead of trying to d it all and being frazzled and exhausted, we only picked our favorites and left plenty of room for downtime and spontaneous outings. We loved Christmastime!

The Follow the Star live nativity and international creche exhibit is always a must-do.

Can’t miss our annual cookie decorating with the Wrights. Maliyah and Allie have always been the most meticulous cookie decorators, whereas the twins and Meredith just slap on the frosting and pour as many sprinkles as the can on each cookie.

It’s fall! The leaves finally started falling off the trees in December and Meredith was so excited to jump in a pile!

The twins’ piano teacher, Miss Jenny, brought them some toy Santa boots that they tried to squeeze on poor Eleanor’s feet.

Reagan’s mom from kindergarten dressed up as a totally legit Cindy Lou Who, complete with a wig and prosthetic nose, and read the kids The Grinch Who Stole Christmas.

Christmas fun at kindergarten.

Santa and Mrs. Clause came to visit the twins’ school and read them stories while the kids drank hot cocoa. Sounds cozy!

Christmas crafts:

Letters so Santa (they had to clarify when Santa came that they meant a toy puppy, not a real one!)

School pictures 2018.

Chilling in the backyard.

Cookie decorating with our neighbors.

Naomi concentrated very hard on her cookie decorating while the twins and Meredith went wild.

The girls love to climb a tree at the end of our cul de sac, and one afternoon, while wearing some boots with a slight heel, Samantha jumped out of the tree and landed “not like a cat,” in Amelia’s words. We thought for sure it was just a sprain, but nope, she broke her #2 metatarsal and had to have a boot on for 3 weeks over Christmas! That’s two broken bones for Samantha, if anyone’s counting.

Samantha did not let the boot stop her from climbing trees again.

We told the twins that anytime you saw someone standing under the mistletoe, you had to tackle them.

Christmas party playdate with Meredith’s playgroup.

Instead of attempting to do gingerbread houses with the girls by myself this year (getting the houses engineered to stand up correctly whilst managing three crazies armed with tubes of frosting is not my forte), we waited for a day Jake could be home to help the, and the whole experience was much less stressful! I just stood back, bit my tongue as Meredith ate more candy than she put on her house, and took pictures.

Eleanor rarely tries to roll over– I think her fat to muscle ration isn’t conducive to rolling!

We bought a small live tree this year for the girls to decorate with their homemade ornaments and other random ones they like.

Mom’s tree that no one was allowed to touch.

Meredith begs us daily to let Eleanor move to her room!

Lots of love,

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: allie, Christmas 2018, Christmas cookies, christmas crafts, Christmas tree, cookie decorating, December 2018, fall leaves, follow the star, maliyah, naomi, nativity, Samantha's broken metatarsal, Santa, santa letter, school santa visit, the wrights, xray

Holiday Sweetness

December 17, 2015 by Rebecca Whitehead

This Christmas, we haven’t been baking as much as usual due to general tiredness and lack of motivation to clean up after the total kitchen destruction that is certain to take place anytime Samantha and Amelia get a hold of flour and frosting. However, we did manage to do some gingerbread house decorating and some cookies, which I’m calling good for the year.

The girls love to be in the kitchen and can often be found with pots, pans, whisks and spatulas, cooking up their own creations while I’m making lunch or dinner. They also love to help make smoothies, pancakes and prepare their own snacks, particularly if it involves anything to do with cutting or spreading with knives– eek!

Just look at that concentration.

I’m not sure how much candy actually made it onto the house as it kept mysteriously disappearing.

A gingerbread masterpiece, complete in all its high fructose corn syrup glory. The girls were happy with just a piece of the gingerbread and then were content to look at it on top of the fridge for a week before I finally threw it out. Jake could always judge my stress level that day when he got home by how many little pieces I had broken off and nibbled on!

In addition to baking, the girls helped put up our lights, tree and other decorations this year.

Somehow we only have about 1/3 of the ornaments on our tree right now as we did two weeks ago. The temptation to pull them off is still very strong for a 2.5 year old, apparently.

This year, Jake took the girls to pick out our tree again, but this time, there were no meltdowns!

The magic of picking out a tree 2014:

Tree (un) decorating 2014:

More baking! Jodi brought over her famous sugar cookies for Samantha, Amelia, Maliyah and Allie to decorate.

Maliyah and Allie have some serious decorating skills and kept their decorating stations miraculously nice and neat. The girls’ areas, in comparison, looked like a nuclear sprinkle bomb went off. I gave up trying to teach them that the entire sprinkle can did not need to end up on one cookie.

Allie very carefully places her ONE sprinkle on her cookie.

Sprinkle overload!

The crazed look of a cookie monster.

Flashback to holiday baking 2014:

Holiday cookie eating 2014:

Speaking of holiday sweetness, Baby Maple made her grand debut at the beginning of December and when Phi texted Amy and me to come meet her one day during nap time, we ran over as fast as possible! There’s nothing like holding a precious newborn to make your heart melt! Especially when I’m not sleep deprived with my own precious newborn!