Dear Santa,

It may take me awhile, but I will get around to doing a full Christmas post.  For now, I'll give you a little preview of our Christmas Eve---the letters to Santa to leave with the cookies and milk!! 

We got the letters, cookies, and milk all set out by the tree...then the realization hit Liam that the cookies were not for him.

"Let me at them...."

"What do you mean they're ALL for Santa?!?!"

"THIS IS THE MOST UNFAIR THING I HAVE EVER EXPERIENCED IN MY LIFE!!"

Eventually we caved and let him have one. 

After that, it was time to get into some Christmas PJ's and read "Twas the Night Before Christmas" :) 

Have yourself a merry little Christmas.

It's hard to not think about all of the tragedy that has taken place recently, especially what happened in Connecticut last week.  I still can't even talk about it, so I'm certainly not going to blog about it...but I will say that it has made me take a step back and focus on the day to day, especially with the kids.  I know I'll be hugging them a little closer this Christmas. 

From our family to yours, Merry Christmas.  We are so excited to spend time with both of our families over the next few days, and we can't wait to see the looks on the kids faces Christmas morning. 

Jake's last Christmas Play *sniff, sniff*

Last Friday was Jake's very last Christmas play with our daycare center, which was very bittersweet.  He landed a speaking role this year!!!  He had been cast as the "18th child" and was taking his role very seriously, and had even been practicing at home.  Here he is before we headed out (no, he did not wear the silly elf at to the play, though he really wanted to):

Liam was the welcome wagon in the auditorium, telling everyone "HI!" when they sat down near us.  Once the play started, he quieted down and actually watched it, I was pleasantly surprised!

The moment was here, the kids took the stage!!

The play was very cute, here is a video (it's long, but Jake's line is around the 1:08 mark):

We were able to snap a few shots of Jake with his friends after the play; we're going to miss these kids next year!

Jake and Maddie

:-)

No need to rush these milestones, right??

I know it's a big developmental milestone for kids to start pronouncing words correctly and to start using the correct pronouns in sentences....but I really don't want Liam to start hitting those particular milestones any time soon.  Because once he does, I'll stop hearing things like, mam-make (pancake), Meep-Meep (binky), Mawny (Molly, his teacher at school) and bwauner (brother).  And once he gets those pronouns straightened out, I'll no longer get to hear "Ha-Do" (hug you) and "Hol Do" (hold you). 

If I could freeze time, I would.

SANTA! I KNOW HIM!!

If you don't know what movie the title of this post is from, I highly suggest to run to your TV and watch "Elf".  Immediately.  GO!

We met the big guy himself on Saturday, and the kids were beside themselves with excitement.  We went to our township community center for "Lunch with Santa" with some friends from daycare.  Liam kept saying "Sanna, Sanna!" and trying to cut in line to get to him.  So, it's finally our turn and he marches his little bum up the set of stairs, trots over to the big Santa throne, I put him on his lap, and.....

Yeah, tears.  Oops. I guess he liked the idea of him more than being plopped into his lap.  The good news is, his reaction to Santa was slightly less upsetting that his reaction to the Easter Bunny. (remember that picture made it onto the Ellen show?  Yeah, this one wasn't quite that bad)

Jake, of course, loved it, and told Santa all about school, his friends, his wish list, etc....  After Jake was done, Liam tried to lunge for Santa again, but then got upset once I started to put him in his lap.  I figured out that he wanted to "talk" to Santa, but not necessarily up close as personal on the lap.  We compromised:

I got my eye on you, big guy.

 After that, there was time to play with friends, make some crafts,play games, get faces painted, and watch "A Charlie Brown Christmas". 

Liam ignore the small kids as always, and tries to play with Jake's friends.

Jake, Nicky, Zach

Jake & Zach, enjoying the Charlie Brown special with some popcorn

Jake's original facepainting request was a transformer; he settled for a tree and rudolph nose.

Zach & Jake, showing off their painted faces

While Liam might not have been a huge fan of Santa up close, he LOVED seeing the reindeer.  As I've mentioned before, deer of any form are his current obsession, so we had to drag him away from this display outside:

They were all holding hands...your heart just melted, right?

One of the moms from daycare had arranged a secret santa gift exchange for all of the kids, so once they finished all of their activities, they tore into their presents.  Jake got a Lego set, and Liam received a small soccer ball and a toddler-sized Finn McMissle car that lights up. 

Is this not the cutest group of kids ever??

We had a great time, and we're so lucky to have found such a great group of friends through daycare! 

Tee! Tee! Tee! Moe Tee!!!

 The translation for the title of this post is, "Tree! Tree!  Tree!  More Tree!"  It's LiamSpeak, in case you didn't realize :) 

The Christmas tree is up in our house, and it's a beauty!! 

The kids LOVED decorating this year, and I'm happy to report that we only had one little incident with a broken ornament.  Totally my fault, too; I sorted through all of them and handed the kids a box of ones that were non-breakables, but I guess I accidentally left a glass one in there.  I heard Liam say, "Ball? Ball?" and turned around just in time to watch him throw it to the ground.  Oops. 

But so far, they've both been great about leaving the tree alone, other than standing back and admiring it (and some non breakables that are conveniently all clustered on the bottom)  There's a reindeer ornament that Liam is OBSESSED with, and every time he wants past the room, he has to go in and give it a kiss.

Admiring his beloved reindeer ornament.

"Why are these lights so bright?  I need a nap"

 Some new favorite ornaments that we received since last Christmas:

I picked up a box of these antique-y looking ornaments at a yard sale over the summer....the glitter makes a huge mess, but they're fun to look at!

Oooooh, sparkle, sparkle!!