Breakfast with Santa

Our gym organized a "Breakfast with Santa" for this morning. The event was very cheap and close to our house, so we thought it was worth a try. Last year, we tried to meet Santa at a breakfast with my hospital and it was super crowded, loud, the food was terrible, and the lines were horrendous. When it was finally our turn to see Santa, Rylan went completely limp and Caroline clung to me for dear life. The whole thing was a huge disappointment.
This year, the kids were interested in meeting Santa again, so off we went with really no idea how it would turn out. This breakfast was very well organized, with small groups of people scheduled in each time slot. We ate our breakfast and then were able to walk right up to meet Santa, no waiting at all. Amazing and almost stress-free for everyone.

Rylan was a little grumpy at breakfast. I think he was still nervous about meeting Santa. He was also confused why Santa was not actually eating breakfast with us at our table. It was called "Breakfast with Santa" after all.

Caroline was feeling pure excitement and enjoying her pancakes and grapes.
Waiting for just a few seconds to meet Santa. I love how Caroline's hands are clasped together and she is snuggling so close to big brother.

Brave boy! This was as close as he would get to Santa, but he smiled and did talk to the big guy in red. Later he told me Santa was much smaller than he thought. Maybe last year Santa had seemed like a giant to him! That certainly explains his fear.

Caroline climbed right into Santa's lab and....froze like a deer in the headlights. Finally she cracked just the tiniest of smiles and asked him for a princess castle. Hmmm, that is good to know.

Rockin' around the Christmas tree

There really are no words to explain these videos, except my kids like to dance and they are crazy excited about Christmas coming.

Videos from Rylan's Christmas Program

I grabbed a couple little clips from Rylan's program with my cell phone. Enjoy!

Rylan's school Christmas program

I don't think there are many things cuter or funnier than children performing in a Christmas program. Rylan's preschool class sang for us on Tuesday and it didn't disappoint. They had been practicing for weeks and were enthusiastic with their hand motions and loudly projected their voices.
We had to sit near the back, so my pictures aren't the clearest. Rylan stood at the very top row of the stands. I was very thankful he didn't fall off, with all his animated gestures and frequent yawning. His sweet friend Leah is the strawberry blonde in the row just in front of him and to the left.



Having Aunt Bethany come with us made for a very fun morning, indeed.

The Christmas tree ribbon t-shirt

Last Christmas when my mom was visiting, we went shopping in Old Colorado City. I saw and took a picture of a dish towel (I think) decorated with ribbons in the shape of a Christmas tree. I saved that picture all year and knew if I found the time to make one thing this Christmas, it would be ribbon Christmas tree t-shirts for me and Caroline. I was really pleased with the way they turned out and it was a great sense of accomplishment to finally make them. Caroline and I have enjoyed our matching festive shirts this season!

Christmas cowboy?

We got a pair of cute plaid Christmas pajamas as hand-me-downs from cousin Samuel this past summer. I pulled them out recently, never expecting Rylan to be so excited about them. He wore them all night and all day, pretending to be Santa Claus. The only red hat he could find at the time was Caroline's cowgirl Jessie hat and he also swiped her stuffed horse as his "reindeer." All day he walked around saying, "ho, ho, ho", asked us what we wanted for Christmas and whether we had been naughty or nice. It was so funny! He did NOT like it if we called him a cowboy, either, because he was most definitely the Real Santa Claus.
(Charlton did get him and Caroline real Santa hats that night and they were thrilled.)

Some random cell phone pics

I apologize, some of these pictures are very old and they are a bit out of order , but are too cute not to share.

Sleeping Beauty and Ironman just before trick-or-treating.

Scary teeth and fingers.

Playing in the snow, for a grand total of about 5 minutes.

We got a second year of wear out of this sweet pumpkin dress. Next year it will be a shirt!

Rylan's first time writing his name all by himself.

Rylan's first turn at show and tell. Can't remember why the 10 fingers. He took his stuffed Nemo. He took Bear-bear on his second turn.

Girl loves her some jewelry.

First day of preschool picture. Caroline is not thrilled about the whole idea.

Rylan was thrilled about this helmet and wore it the entire time of our preschool orientation.

Princess Rapunzel.

Caroline looks like she is all ready for a fine spring day at Keeneland, but actually we are watching brother at soccer camp this summer and she has "stolen" all my accessories.

Birthday cake time

I had been planning on making Caroline a ladybug cake since this summer when she was so crazy about them. I also had an inspiration for decorating the cake, so selfishly, I continued to plant that idea in her head even when she went all princess crazy on me a month ago. I think she was still delighted with her cake even though ladybugs are so last season!
Since it was Thanksgiving, I made a pumpkin cake with cream cheese icing. I thought it turned out very delicious, and cute, too.

Sweet expression at the first sight of her cake with candles.

Happy Birthday, Caroline!

Blowing out the candles!

She doesn't to wait for me to cut a piece. What a ham!

Digging in. Who needs forks, anyway?

Yum!

Caroline's 3rd birthday

Caroline's 3rd birthday landed right on Thanksgiving this year, so it was a really big day in our house. I had been reminding my sweet girl of her birthday for weeks, but I still don't think she had any idea of how much fun it would be. She was so happy and enjoyed every part of her day, from the presents to cake and candles.

We only ate two meals on Thanksgiving, so we made them hearty ones! Here is some breakfast goofiness from the birthday girl.

Rylan was ever so eager to help Caroline with opening presents.

We let Caroline open her presents from Grammy early in the morning. She loved her new Snow White doll.


We watched the "Snow White" movie right away. Finally, we are starting to build our Princess movie collection. Thanks, Grammy!

We were able to save more presents for later in the day when Aunt Bethany could celebrate with us.





Caroline opening her horse PJ's from Nana. She had fun with her Little People van, too. Thanks, Nana! This was the only picture I managed to get of part of the really neat fold-up barn from Aunt Bethany. Caroline loved playing with it, when we could pry it away from Rylan. He thought his sister's new toys were much cooler than his own that day.

Sixties in Colorado...

....means sunbathing and picnics! Caroline has been begging me several times a week to have a picnic for lunch. I don't think she realizes winter is here. When we had a few lovely days that actually felt like fall, I was so glad to finally be able to say Yes! to her request. Rylan wanted to take his shirt off and Caroline did her best to show more skin. The warm sunshine felt so wonderful and I was glad to join them, fully dressed, of course!
I promise I do feed Rylan, and he does eat! He looks a lot like my siblings and I did when we were younger, fairly tall and very skinny. Oh, to have that metabolism again...

Raking leaves

Last year I got the most wonderful spontaneous picture of the kids lying in the leaves. I tried to repeat it this year, with not quite as good results. Still cute, though. With some help from a few windy days, all the leaves finally fell from our aspen trees....and blew into everyone else's yard! We still filled several bags, but it didn't seem as big of a job this year. Sorry to our neighbors who thought they were sparing themselves a lot of work by not planting trees.