A very Merry Christmas Day!

I love the look of the front room after Santa visits!

Abi was so excited when Christmas morning finally came!

Santa always leaves a friend with the girls. This year Abi got a baby Aurora and Maddy got a baby Belle.

Abi was surprised that Santa didn't eat all three cookies.. but then decided that he left one for her to eat.

the reaction and look on her face when she noticed the tent was hilarious. Then it got better when she realized there was stuff inside...

both girls were quite taken with the tent...

Abi opened her presents from Santa first. This one came with a note. She had been asking for a Polly Pocket train for months and Santa left her a note telling her he didn't have a Polly train but got her this roller coaster instead. It has been a huge hit! We all love playing with it.

the most anticipated gift... the number one on her list.. was the Moon Dough Barn.

Afterward, Abi went through her stocking and then poured out Maddy's...

Then Maddy got a turn to open her gifts from Santa..

After all the Santa gifts were opened, Doug and I went through our stockings and then we started unwrapping the gifts from under the tree.

We brought out hot cocoa and sausage muffins to munch on while we opened.

We always take turns. Doug opens a gift, I open a gift, Abi, then Maddy and keep going until they are all gone.

Abi picked the ones from Grandma and Grandpa first...

So, I gave Maddy the ones from them first as well.

An American Girl doll!

Maddy LOVES it. You can see her being curious in the picture below. Right after that she put her face right on the plastic and just staring at her. When we took her out she just hugged and hugged her.

This is one of my favorite pictures from the day....

The chaos of Christmas morning surrounding my little sweetie making one of my favorite faces.

Abi with her bounty..

From Santa: a tent, a scooter, Moon dough barn,Polly Roller coaster, build a bear kit, Tinkerbell and Mulan polly pocket sets, Aurora, a Barbie movie, a Zhu zhu pet, a book, and stocking stuffers as well as a nursery set to share with Maddy.

From Maddy: a Hello Kitty puzzle

From mom and Dad: the Rapunzel hair thing to share with Maddy, book, and jammies

From my Uncle Kimball and family: a Dora wallet

From her cousin Courtney: two Polly Pocket sets

From Grandma and Grandpa: a Disney cupcake playset, a Disney ice cream playset, a Tinkerbell playset, and a stuffed Mickey Mouse

From Aunt Melinda and family: a big Cordz drawing thing

From Grammy and Grandfather: a dance bag, dancing class, this adorable Christmas outfit, and jammies

Maddy's stuff....

From Santa: the nursery set to share with Abi, books, movies, a Princess beanbag toss game, a bunch of beanbags, a Rapunzel doll, and Belle doll

From mom and dad: the rapunzel thing to share with Abi, books ,and jammies

From Abi: Princess squeeze toys

From Grandma and Grandpa: American Girl Doll and Nemo stuffed animal

From cousins Alex, Tyler, and Matthew: 2 adorable knit hats with 3 knit flowers and two Usborne books

From Aunt Melinda and family: bath toys

From Grammy and Grandfather: a Very Hungry Caterpillar playset, the adorable Christmas outfit, and jammies

My Uncle Kimball and family: a Cookie Monster book

Our family gifts:

From us to ourselves: the new Disney puzzle, Operation, Beauty and the Beast, and the Christmas Tanagrams

My parents: A Disney throw blanket, a Mickey towel, Mickey sprinkles, some candy, a Mickey ornament, Despicable Me, some fun money, and a really great book.

From my sister: the CD and DVD by Jenny Phillips that my niece took part in.

Melinda: some fun money

Doug's gifts:

from me: a snuggie, stocking stuffers, the Narnia books, jeans he hasn't bought yet, a Star Wars coloring book, and lots of treats (some not pictured)

Doug's parents: a robe

my Uncle Kimball: 17 Again

Abi and Maddy: giant licorice

Abi: a painting

my sister Steph: a McDonalds gift card and a Best Buy gift card

My loot:

From Doug: Harry potter house cups, a Gryffindor scarf, the Hunger Games trilogy boxset, Eclipse, Leviathan, and treats

From my sister in law Karen (and family): a cute frame scrapbooked with pictures of the girls and a bookmark

Dougs parents: a robe

my Uncle Kimball and family: earrings and a necklace

It is so fun to spend the rest of the day just playing.

Maddy loved her beanbag toss!

For dinner we had our traditional ham and mashed potatoes with rolls and the opening of Christmas crackers.

Everyone has to wear their crowns during dinner.

I hope everyone had a great and joyful Christmas!

Christmas Eve

I love Christmas Eve.

There is so much anticipation and wonder in the air!

I got Maddy dressed in a Christmas dress and I wore my Christmas shirt so we would feel festive.

Abi, like her dad, wanted to stay in jammies all day.

Our Christmas Eve day tradition is that Doug and Abi play legos. The past couple of years they would get out Doug's big Lego castle from the basement and put it together.

This year we pulled out a Lego mosaic toy that we got many years ago but were saving until she was old enough.

It was really cool.

We, of course, tracked Santa all day on Norad.

And we decorated cookies for Santa.

We didn't bake them this year because a few months ago when I needed to make sugar cookies for something I thought ahead and made a few Christmas tree shapes as well that I froze.

Ready for Santa...

Every year we get a new family game. This year I decided we would start opening them on Christmas Eve day so we have something fun to play with as a family while dinner is cooking.

This year I got Operation. It's very different from the one I had when I was a kid, but still fun.

We had our traditional Cafe Rio burrito dinner and watched a Christmas Movie. Usually it's The Nativity Story or Muppets Christmas Carol but this year we started watching The Santa Clause 2 earlier in the day and Abi wanted to finish it.

After that it was time for baths and then we got to do one of my favorite things- open our Christmas Eve jammies and books!

First me..

then Doug...

then Abi. This was the funniest thing. I made this Rapunzel hair bow holder patterned after one I saw in Catching Fireflies and I wrapped it up the same day I wrapped the girls pajamas. I labeled them wrong. So, Abi thought she was opening her jammies and pulled this out instead.

She was so confused.

I explained to her that I had made it for her and Maddy and I found the other present under the tree that I thought had Rapunzel in it. She then was able to open her jammies and book.

Doug helped Maddy open hers up...

The tradition of jammies on Christmas eve goes back to both of our families. I love it. It is so fun to go to bed in new pajamas on Christmas Eve and stay in them all day on Christmas!

I just started the book tradition a few years ago after reading about another family that did it. The idea behind it was that their kids always had a new book to read so that when they woke up on Christmas morning they could read their book while they waited to go open gifts.

It is another favorite addition for me because I love books so much!

This year I got Leviathan by Scott Westerfield. It is so good... if you like young adult sci-fi steampunk type fantasy.

Abi got a Rapunzel book.

Maddy got a new Goodnight Moon book- our old one was falling apart.

I didn't give Doug books with his jammies because he really doesn't read much.

Trying to get pictures of the girls together is always a challenge because Maddy is such a wiggle worm.. here is one of the first attempts...

Finally I realized it was best to get a picture with her just doing her thing...which at the moment was trying to take ornaments off of the tree.

It resulted in a picture I love! They are both actually looking at the camera and Abi is showing off an ornament she just saved from Maddy!

The Family jammie picture!

After this we read some stories, did the nativity flannel board story and a gifts to Jesus family home evening activity, and got the girls to bed.

Christmas Tradition: Other Advent activities

We have many activities for advent. Along with the tree, we have this advent streamer. My mom made it for us and it is a tradition I had in my home growing up.

There is a ribbon for each day of advent and you use them to tie on a treat. We used to use mini candy canes but a few years ago I switched to tootsie rolls. Each night you switch turns to take off the treat.

Another activity we do each day of the advent is to read a Christmas story. We can pick from our book of advent stories my mom gave us or one of our Christmas books from our Christmas book basket. I love sitting by the lit tree with the girls reading Christmas stories! It's wonderful.

Christmas Tradition: The advent tree

The Advent tree is one of my very favorite of our Christmas traditions. I made it back in 2008 after seeing something similar in Pottery Barn. The first year I filled up the pockets with little toys and clues to things around the house.

Last year it was filled with little surprises, treats, and activities.

This year, we were gone for most of December but for the days we were here I filled the pockets with activities like 'make a Christmas craft', 'watch a Christmas movie and have hot cocoa', etc.

Next year I plan on making every day an activity again with the exception of the book on day one.

Christmas Tradition: A new Christmas book

This tradition goes along with our advent tree. The pocket for December 1st is bigger than the rest because it always holds a book.

I get a new Christmas book every year.

I love this tradition. It is so much fun to pick out that new book and I love having a large collection of cute books to pick from every night of December.

This years book will end up being a tradition as well. I got the 12 Elves. It has 12 elves inside- like really thick paperdolls. Each has a name and a personality. You read about one elf per night and say a little chant for it to come out that night. Then I hide it somewhere that has to do with the personality and the next morning Abi gets to find it.

As soon as all 12 elves are out, it's Christmas.

We had a lot of fun with this.

Some Disney!

I have updated our new disney blog up through day 4.

You can follow these links or add the blog to your blog list (or both!)

The new blog is : Our Disney Memories (ourdisneymemories.blogspot.com)

Day one and two: driving to florida

Day two: the Reveal video

Day two: The Resort

The autograph book and pins

Day 3: Hollywood Studios day one and Narcooses

Day 4: Rest and Resort Hopping

I hope you will all check it out!!

A Little teaser

I just bought my extra storage so there should be some mega Disney updates (as well as Christmas!) over the next few days.

For now, here is a little teaser shot...

I'll be updating soon

So apparently, blogger gives you a certain amount of photo storage and I have exceeded it. I will be purchasing more so I can continue to blog with photos.. it's not very much thank goodness. But until I get it I will not be updating with Christmas or Disney. Hopefully I'll be catching up in a couple of days.

A little blog fun

I have decided that I am starting a new blog just for the Disney trip. I have over a thousand pictures... we were there for two weeks and did so many insanely incredible things that I just want to post about all of it! Also, I was thinking it might be easier to do a blog about the trip that I can print out in book form rather than having to develop all the pictures and scrapbook them!
So, in the next few days I will have that updating the trip and I will leave links to each update on this blog.

Disney World days one and two: Driving to Florida

We drove away from our house at 12:30, technically Wednesday December 1st although it still felt like Tuesday. We like leaving in the middle of the night because then the girls sleep for so much more of the trip.

Abi asked where we were going in the middle of the night and we told her we were going to visit my cousin Lora in Georgia, which we were. They both stayed awake for about an hour.

Abi fell asleep first. Maddy was being a little whiny but we gave her a bottle and she soon fell fast asleep. She woke up a little later and we gave her some apple juice and she fell back to sleep again.

Most of you know that when we go on road trips I have state line prizes for Abi. Because it was so dark she didn't get her Illinois state prize until Kentucky and so for the first few prizes we gave them out every few hours instead of at state lines.

It was snowing a little as we drove through Illinois and worse in Indiana but it only lasted about halfway into Kentucky and then went away so that was nice.

We stopped in Kentucky for gas and were surprised at how COLD it was. We got some hot cocoa in the gas station and Abi wanted some chocolate milk.

I took over driving at about 8:30am. Everyone else was napping.

Then Abi woke up. I asked Doug to get her the next prize and while he was shuffling around in my bag looking for it, Abi threw up. Luckily she had her big quilt over her so the clean up was minimal... just her and the blanket. This freaked me out. Here I had been keeping the girls in the house for weeks and trying so hard not to get us sick before the trip just to have her get sick on the way down! But, she was fine. It was the chocolate milk!

After cleaning her up, changing her clothes, and bundling the blanket and clothes up in a bag to wash later we set out again.

Abi got her next prize and Maddy woke up and both girls played with Maddy's toy and seemed happy.

Here is Abi with her second prize...

Maddy enjoyed telling us that she does not enjoy these long road trips as much as Abi does...

but she did really enjoy ripping up the wrapping paper from Abi's prizes!

The day did seem to last forever. It was nice breaking it up with the prizes and a few stops. (Maddy got a couple of prizes too... just not as many as Abi)

As we drove through Tennessee we saw a lot of cool hanging icicles that were really pretty as well as these beautiful waterfalls... they looked much different on our way home.. more on that later!

We got to my cousin Lora's house in Atlanta around 4:30. I can't believe I didn't take a single picture but we were all exhausted! She had a great dinner for us and then we were able to just hang out and catch up. Abi called their playroom "amazing!" I was so impressed by her polite and well behaved kids and we just had so much fun there.

Thanks Lora for letting us stay!!

I was able to wash the blanket and soiled clothes and we went to bed around 10.

I woke up around 3am antsy and ready to go so I woke up Doug asking if we could head out. We finally got on the road around 4:30. It was VERY cold.

The girls slept a bit...

We stopped at a gas station in Vienna Georgia and had breakfast at the McDonalds inside of it.

This was a funny day because Abi didn't ask any questions. She just assumed that we had driven all that way just to spend the night at Lora's and now we were on our way home.

Maddy realized that her new tray could be used for peek a boo...

Some florida state line prizes....

I got Maddy a little alligator teether

Abi colored the front of the princess wooden coloring toy and then made her own princess on the back...

We were almost there... time to spill the beans.

Next up: the big reveal