Christmas and New Years festivities

Frank posting this time...
Having successfully survived the Thanksgiving feast it was time to prepare for Christmas. 


The last few days leading up to the big event were a bit challenging because Mason, Maddie and Janet all came down with one or another illness, all one after the other. Maddie also is going through an angry phase that presents some challenges for the poor stressed parental units. Nevertheless some fun was to be had. First off Maddie and Mason's annual daycare Christmas play where each class of kids represented a kind of animal as part of a series of Christmas songs. Here are Maddie and her friend Susan and Grace are all decked out in chicken gear, loudly singing along:

Mason was a horned sheep, a very unhappy sheep indeed, who wanted to be held by Daddy instead of standing up on stage. Here he is seconds pre-meltdown.

Janet's parents made the trip to see the play and I think they enjoyed the songs.  No good photos of them, and very few good ones of the kids during the play.  But here are some very happy chickens, hopped up on cookies after the play:

Once we left the church where the play had been held Mason returned to his usual cheery self and had a blast playing with his sheep horns:

Just like last year, our Christmas elf made an appearance and baffled the kids by magically appearing in a different spot every morning, so he could report to Santa on the kids' behavior......not that that did much good.........

Mason was excited to help with getting ready for Christmas. Here he is organizing the multitude of presents under the tree by thoughtfully stacking as many as he could on top of each other.

Maddie loves cookies and also likes to bake them together with Mommy, here a batch of yummy almond macaroons:

And here a batch of sugar cookies:

The entire family got involved in decorating sugar cookies with icing, gingerbread men sprinkles and colorful sugar balls. The colorful sugar balls were the only thing Mason was interested in. I don't think he ate a single cookie but he ate many colorful sugar balls off the cookies.

The end product:

As a special surprise for me, Maddie and Janet made a banjo cookie, wasn't quite as musical as the real thing but tasty nonetheless.

Tada!!!!

Did I mention she likes cookies?

And we continued our Christmas tradition of eating cheese fondue on Christmas Eve night. Maddie really liked the cheese dipping this year and wanted another fondue night for New Year's Eve.

Another tradition is the opening of one and only one present on Christmas Eve. The kids loved their new pajamas, to be worn on Christmas morning:

Finally the long awaited Christmas morning. Our rugrats got spoiled rotten but I only have room to post some examples of the many gifts. Here's Maddie with a new tea set from Santa that she really liked.  She asked for one in her letter to him.

And a scooter, very high up on the wish list this year.

Mason got inundated with a couple of different Duplo (Legos for toddlers) sets and he really liked them. Here he's helping the fisherman from the camping set reel in his big catch of the day.

And a scooter for him, too. He was really excited about his helmet and put it on before we could even take all the tags off.

Maddie with a craft book from Great Aunt Rosemarie in Germany.

And Mason with a car transporter from Oma and Opa.  He played with it for at least an hour that morning.

One of their big gifts was a new play kitchen from Oma and Opa. As you can see, they wasted no time putting their pots and pans to good use in the new kitchen.

And here is Maddie's "Golden Dress and Golden Crown," her number one wish this year and one that was specially made by Santa's sewing elves.....too bad she had the dress taken away for a week just two days later as punishment for unacceptable behavior.......sigh!

Scooter time: both of them figured out how to ride these things really fast. Mason is definitely a boy. While he's taking longer with other developmental things than Maddie did, he picks up physical skills really, really quickly.

The next day Grandmama, Granddaddy and Uncle David came up for even more spoilage of the rugrats. Grandmama presents Mason with yet another gigantic dinosaur to cuddle with. Mason had been having some issues with not wanting to go to bed and not wanting to be covered up lately. Now the dino goes to bed with him, gets covered up and Mason does the same...yay dino!

Uncle David unwraps his camelback pak for mountain biking excursions while Maddie is yet again showing off the "Golden Dress".

I had not asked for very much for Christmas but really wanted to finish setting up my brewery in the garage. Thanks to a couple days off before Christmas in which I managed to start and/or finish a few projects, I was able to squeeze in an inaugural brew session on the new system...me likey! Another project which you will hear more about in the future.......chicken coop! Stay tuned.

New Years Eve was a gorgeous day, so we took the kids to a park and let them run wild for a while:

We brought a picnic lunch and ate it in the park. The kids really enjoyed it, although the wind was brisk.  Brr! Picnics are one of Maddie's favorite things.

Later that day we invited Salem and her family over for some pre New Year fun. Of course the girls wanted to play dress up......and Mason got right in the middle of it......

The kids were having a blast playing and then conked out in front of the TV, wrapped up in blankies. And the adults actually got to have some grown up conversations (or not depending on the number of Margaritas consumed)......amazing.

Everybody ended up having a late night and we were all very tired the next day. At least it was from having fun and not from working.  Hope everyone had a great start to 2012!

Closing in on Christmas....a recap of fall activities

 When last we left, we were about to experience Halloween. I know, it's been a while.

Maddie was a Rainbow Princess Fairy, just like she wanted. I had to meet a guy from Craigslist in a parking lot to get the outfit -- and then clean it -- but hey, she was happy. And she was cute.



Here she is at her school Halloween parade. Her friend, Gwen is beside her.

Next, we have Mason, who was a red dragon with a very lopsided head.  He liked his outfit and roared his way through the school parade.  And as a bonus, the costume kept him very warm (smile.)

And Frank and I dressed up as gnomes.  We put quite a bit of work into the costumes, complete with embroidered red pointy hats.  Thanks to Maddie for taking this very retro-looking photo.  It looked cuted and funny in person, I promise.  We all went to Maddie's friend Salem's birthday party, which happens to also be a Halloween party.  Even the adults dress up, but we still attracted some attention.  I think they were just jealous of Frank's beard and my apron.  Ha!

At Salem's party, the Rainbow Fairy shows that a hoodie can be a stylish magical accessory.

Happy Birthday, Salem!  Love the pink hair.  Rock on girl!

Salem's aunt is always dressed as a scary witch.  I think she is the single most exciting thing for the kids every year.  She did not disappoint this year, and chased them until they were all worn out.  Even Mason was interested in her!

Another gnomette pose.  This apron belonged to my late Grandmama Kelly.  I've kept it for ten years, so it's about time it was put to use.

And here you can see the full magnitude of the gnome beard.  Frank was quite proud of his creation.

Finally, Halloween night arrived.  After the parade and birthday party, it was the third and final time to dress up.  BUT, it was pouring rain and cold.  What to do???  We decided to put on rain boots, hit a few close houses and head back home.  At least we can say we tried.

Frank is trying to shelter a small dragon from the driving rain.

After we made it home, we had to completely strip Mason, he was soaked through from the rain.  But the kids didn't care.  They poured out their candy loot and we let them eat some extra because it was such yucky weather.  For the first time, Mason really enjoyed his Halloween and could play with Maddie and eat some candy.  It was pretty cool.

Maddie's monster teeth.  Should we call the dentist??

The first weekend in November, Frank and I headed to Asheville for a few nights without kids.  Thanks Mama and Daddy for taking care of the munchkins so we could have some much-needed vacation.  We went hiking, shopping, eating and even to a fancy pants spa.  It was great and the weather was wonderful.  The leaves were still hanging on the trees and it made us wonder if we wouldn't want to retire to Asheville someday....hmmm.

We scored free tickets to the Biltmore House Christmas Tour, which is a pretty expensive package.  Someone at our bed and breakfast had extra tickets.  So we rearranged our plans and took the tour.  I think our favorite part was the conservatory.  Like a huge greenhouse with every kind of plant you can imagine.  Here's a pineapple plant.  We used to grow these when we lived in Texas.

Frank and I in the conservatory.

Back at the bed and breakfast, which we loved.  Our room had a balcony, so we enjoyed our afternoon wine and cheese while overlooking the huge back yard.  It was really a nice break.

Cheers!

Back at home, I took a ton of funny shots.  Mason is just so comical.  All his teachers comment on how hilarious he is.  Sometimes, he is actually trying to be coy, but he is just naturally cute and funny to those who are around him enough.  Here he is clad in diaper and homemade socks from his Ur Oma (Great Grandmama) in Germany.

Which means it must be time to ride the bounce horse. Which everyone does in diapers and wool socks, right??

Homemade bird masks for a kids music concert we ended up not going to -- oh well, next time.

How many little boys can you fit in a MegaBlocks box?  Um, just one.

Toboggan buddies. 

Maddie is still way into her artwork.  She has started to draw connecting lines with different colors.  Frank and I think it looks like something from MOMA, of course.  But we may be a little biased.

Our youngest kitty, Ginger has been diagnosed with kidney failure, so we have her on a special diet and medicines and frequent blood tests.  She is the one the kids like most, because she is the only one they've ever been able to pet.  Mason asks to pet her frequently and I always try to make it happen.  We aren't sure how much longer she'll be with us, but we want to give her all the love we can while she is here.

Thanksgiving attire from daycare complete with feather headress. His teachers took the liberty of naming him "Fire Eyes."  Weird.

Maddie's homemade hat was a turkey with long wiggly legs.  I went to her classroom's Thanksgiving luncheon and she was really proud to show off all the manners she had been learning in class.

On Thanksgiving day, we went to Grandmama and Grandaddy's house to eat and of course, ride around the farm.  At some point, Maddie and Mason got to work loading up pine straw with Grandaddy.  Maddie is sometimes very excited about yard work -- sometimes not so much.

A few weeks later, we make our annual trip to Meadow Restaurant and then to the Meadow Lights.  Also as usual, Amy, Grant and Stella Dot went with us.  There were a couple new light displays, and the food was awesome as always.  We got there early and by the time we left, the lines were wrapped around the parking lot -- nuts!

Mason on the train looking at lights.

We went to the tree farm the next day and picked out a normal size tree for a change. 
I tried to get a couple of photos of the kids decorating the tree.  This year, unlike last year, the tree has not fallen over.  But Mason broke 3 or 4 ornaments when he tried to use them like drumsticks.  Maddie broke her glass ice cream cone ornament from last year.  She was very sad, but I was able to find one exactly like it on Ebay.  yay!

Mason hanging last year's dinosaur ornament.

Maddie always wants to put the star on top.  This year, Mason wanted to put the star on top also.  Next year, we might have to flip a coin for it.

The finished product.  I love a live tree.  And so does Sunny apparently.