More than Mothering: Holiday Happenings

Friday, December 28, 2012

Holiday Happenings

We did many fun things during this holiday season. You've already seen our Thanksgivings and Black Friday traditions. Now I'll move on to the smaller, more random things we like to do during the holidays.

Movie night

We are always watching Christmas movies--but usually they're just on in the background, or we catch 20 mins of one before bed some nights.

But every so often, we get to sit down as a family to watch a movie in its entirity. This year, we did that one night with Polar Express, and we made movie necklaces. They're like candy necklaces, but with random treats--pretzels, gummy lifesavers, fudge cookies--basically whatever you can string on twine.

The finished product provided quite the snack for movie-watching.

The four bigger girls all made their own.

They may or may not have gotten carried away--HA!

It was a fun family activity!

And Scrunchie wasn't left out--I made her necklace for her. Looks like I got carried away as well!

And at some point in the movie--some people just couldn't stay awake anymore. But we all had so much fun. Great memories.

Look at lights
Like many families, we drive around in pj's with hot cocoa and looked at Christmas lights. We always drive out to a fundraiser light display out at the lake. This is a great show, and the kids love it.

We also drive around random neighborhoods to look at lights, but we make sure to hit a partiular historic neighborhood every single year. The homes are so gorgeous and Victorian. I would love to live in a neighborhood as festive as this one.

See Santa
We always get a professional picture with Santa, but we also get one with THE REAL SANTA at my MOPS group.

Each year, Santa comes to our party and reads a story. He also poses for pictures with the kids. Of course, my older kids are in school during this time, so I usually only get my younger kids in the picture. Yes, I've thought about taking them out of school just so they can see Santa, but I've never done it!

Hunk and I got our picture taken while celebrating at MOPS.

He's a happy boy.

His first Christmas!

Santa read to the kiddos.

There were snacks and a coloring table all set up for the kids.

Nutcracker (which will have it's own post soon)

The girls were cast as dolls this year. Bug is the Arabian and Brownie is the Hungarian.

All the dolls together.

This is such a huge part of our Christmas season (actually our entire first half of the school year). We spend weekend time rehearsing starting in September. And while my girls have smaller parts than the older kids, they are still heavily committed--especially considering their age. They love it--so I love it. And we've made some great memories while participating the last two years. We see friends, have late nights, put on make up, and best of all-- my girls get to show their talent to the audience during performances.

My girls with Miss Abby--she used to be our neighbor--her mama is a dear friend of mine.

We also make it a point to take the dancers to see the opposite cast's performance. This is the only time they get to see the whole show all the way through.

I got to take the two of them this year!

Live Nativity
Our preschool's church does a live nativity every year--and we finally made it out there this year. This is the 5th year we've tried to go and actually made it. The line looked long, but it really wasn't that bad. So fun!

The church has a recording of songs and the story. It's a neat show.

Live Donkey included.

Penguin Man
He is our version of Elf on the Shelf. He's magic. He knows Santa. He sees all that we do. He brings fun and the spirit of Christmas to our house. One night, he got really creative and replaced the old candy corn I'd left in our candy jar with actual Christmas candy. We were all relieved, but Penguin Man sure did make a production our of it!

He left a trail of the old candy and dumped the pile near a trash can. Clever little fella.

He's a rhyming fool--leaving us notes all the time.

Cookie Baking
Like many families, we do plenty of holiday baking. Some of this baking is for family, some for friends, my MOPS group, cookie exchanges, and teachers. My MOPS group does a cookie exchange every year--and I participated for the second or third time this year. I made Butterfinger cookies--delish! My friend Caroline hosted us all at her house, but of course I didn't get a single picture.

And we can't leave out the Jolly Ol' Man--we made Gingerbreads for him per, Peach's request.

Each girl got to decorate and eat one cookie!

And they each got to pick one of our finished products to put on Santa's plate.

This one got to eat the goods!

Poor Boushka was so tired this night that she fell fast asleep on our couch before the cookie-baking commenced.But she did pick one to go on S man's plate.

Here is the frosting recipe I used--worked like a charm!

And this year was made extra special by a Snow Day on what was supposed to be the last day of school for the year. Yes, we missed our parties, but we had so much fun this day!

We had several day's advanced warning--but nobody actually thought we'd get the day off.

The view from our breakfast nook on the morning of our Snow Day! Glorious!

Decorate

It may not look like much, but this living room is so cozy during the holidays. We decorate with our own unique touch--and we love spending time in here during the winter.

This is the view looking down into the room from our stairs.

And from the opposite corner.

At the foot of the stairs.

Opposite the stairs again but including the tree this time.

I adore a lit up Christmas tree at night.

Christmas Programs at Preschool

Both preschool girls performed in the preschool's Christmas program. They don't allow pictures or video during the performance, so I get after shots by the tree.