Christmas Fun #2 & #3

After we finish opening presents, eat a yummy breakfast, and get dressed, it is time to head to Taylorsville for more Christmas fun. Nanny and Paw host us all for a delicious Christmas lunch, followed by little girls who do not nap and more presents!

A funny from this year: Nanny and Paw got the girls some Jelly Belly jelly beans in their Christmas gift. Anna has had jelly beans before, so she went to work. Little did she know, these jelly beans come in all sorts of flavors (in other words, not just fruit) and she picked a red one. A moment later, she had her mouth pried wide open asking for her water with a panicked look on her face... she had picked a cinnamon jelly bean!

All three kids playing together nicely before lunch!

This is blurry... but Anna Kate is sharing her lovey with Carter. And I love how he is looking at her!

One of the highlights of Anna's Christmas was getting to "help" with Carter. Proud girl!

We may have had to start helping her here... though Carter didn't mind chasing his bottle around.

Ru helping Anna get into some Moravian cookies from Nanny!

YUM!

Gigi teaching the girls how to use their Frozen readers from Nanny and Paw. It reads the books to them!

Little girl and a biiiiiiig present!

"Working together" to hand out gifts.

All of the blonde girls! And some cookies!

After Nanny and Paw's, we head over to a full house at Great Grandma Marshall's. Anna Kate had to visit the cows first, obviously, and then enjoyed a large amount of carrots and dip. Though we had a few tantrums (due to too much fun and no napping) she managed to enjoy herself with her extended family before we headed home for the night. We don't usually get too many pictures at this visit since it is so busy and the lighting is low, but here are some cute girls...

Silly girls with their dolls from Uncle Richard and Aunt Terry

Ru photobombed the girls!

Christmas Fun #1

As you know from year's past, we have lots of Christmases to attend over the holiday season so that we can enjoy the company of all of our family and friends. One of our favorite parts of Christmas though, is waking up in our house, just the three of us to enjoy opening gifts and spending time together. This year, Anna Kate really seemed to "get" Christmas- everything from celebrating the birth of Jesus to Santa bringing presents. We even took her to the Christmas eve service at church for the first time this year, which was a special tradition we are excited to begin enjoying again. In terms of Santa, we never went to visit the man in red, as Anna would tell me, "I'm not going to sit on his lap" (which is completely believable given the fact she is still fairly shy). She did tell me, and anyone she would talk to, that she wanted Santa to bring her chocolate. Sweet girl.

So, here are our pictures from Christmas morning. Mark jokes that he doesn't know who was more excited- Anna Kate or Mommy. Christmas is so much more fun with little ones!

She didn't understand why we had to sit on the steps and wait. It was mainly because Mark was still getting up out of bed...

Excited faces!

Looking to see what Santa brought!

Sven had to immediately get into the high chair she asked Santa for.

And of course there was CHOCOLATE! Before breakfast!

Opening gifts!

Santa brought color drops for the bath! (insert question, "Can we go take a bath right now?")

Feeding her baby in the high chair!

Bailey's thoughts on the whole matter. She was cropped out of pretty much every photo... someone wanted breakfast and didn't care about presents!

Gingerbread Trials

Now that Anna is old enough to participate in "crafts" and not make the world's biggest mess or get too frustrated, I decided we should take some time to do some traditional Christmastime crafts. We did a lot with paper, glue, and paint, but I decided to photograph our adventures building a gingerbread house and then later decorating gingerbread cookies. Needless to say, next year I will be assembling the house without the help of a two year old, as A) I won't have a two year old and B) it is hard to build a gingerbread house, and even harder when the pieces you are building with are broken.

It started all innocent. We laid out all of the pieces. Despite never having made a gingerbread house alone, I figured "how hard could it be?" and Anna Kate figured "how much can I eat?".

Photography stopped while Mommy tried and failed to put together the house. So here, Anna is posing with our broken house that had no chance.

"Ah, whatever, let's just eat the house and candy!"

"And lick the frosting, because that is the best part!" (To AK)

Next up were gingerbread men. In the end, they turned out way better than the house, but the start was a little rocky. Turns out the recipe needed copious amounts of flour to be able to be rolled and cut successfully, which might of well have been a different recipe. Anna slept through that part, so she just woke up to lots of little gingerbread men!

Let's get this party started!

It's a shame she doesn't like M&Ms.

Decorated! With a mouth full of M&Ms.

Done!

Merry Christmas!

We will be very busy over the next few days, enjoying time with family and friends and celebrating CHRISTMAS! (Which means lots of pictures, which also means that the blog will get some updates!) We hope each and every one of you reading this has a very special and wonderful Christmas, we love you!

And since no blog post is complete without photos, here are some extra pictures from our at home "Christmas photo session"!

Cutie and a Christmas tree!

Working on her poses...

She thought this was hilarious!

The ultimate Christmas card winner!

And we are done. It is pretty difficult keeping the attention of a 2.5 year old long enough to sit/stand still AND smile. Here she is saying "CHEEEEEEESE"!

Getting Ready for Christmas!

We haven't taken too many photos lately (story of this blog), but the weekend after Thanksgiving we got right on decorating the house for Christmas, and Anna Kate suggested we get out the camera and take some pictures (of her) with her trees. She is very excited about Christmas, and I'm sure the next few years will continue to become more and more exciting, but for now it is magical seeing her light up during this season!

A short funny story- if you haven't asked AK what she wants for Christmas yet, you should. Her answer: "Chocolate!" I guess we don't give the girl enough treats, haha! Santa may have a little chocolate treat up his sleeve for her stocking!

Right after church. Mommy likes her pretty gold and white tree, and while I'm sure it won't live on too many more years, this year Anna was satisfied with putting the colored lights on the ficus tree.

"Mommy! Take my picture! Cheeeeeeeeese!"

Helping Mommy decorate the big tree.

Careful ornament placement is key. In Anna's world, that means on the far left bottom of the tree. All the ornaments.

This picture may not be great, but you need to notice the ornaments on the floor. Those would be the ones AK couldn't get to go on the tree, so once they hit the floor they were obviously no good anymore!

It's A.....

In case you haven't heard through the grapevine... I'll let Anna Kate tell you about new baby Rotman, coming in April 2016!