Christmas Traditions

Daddy and I grew up having different traditions for Christmas.  A few of Daddy's family traditions growing up were getting a real Christmas tree the day after Thanksgiving and watching TBS' 24 hours of "The Christmas Story" (and once it ends on Christmas night, it's not uncommon for them to put in their DVD to continue watching it).   A few of my family's traditions growing up were getting a new ornament that was related to things going on in our lives (for example, in 1986, I was into gymnastics, so my ornament from that year is a bear doing a cartwheel) and going to church on Christmas eve.  When Daddy and I got married, we began to merge family traditions.  Now that you're getting older and starting to understand what Christmas means, we're trying to figure out what our family traditions are going to be.  I'm sure we'll try a lot of different things and some won't become tradition, but hopefully many will become annual traditions.

We've already tackled a few of our Christmas traditions this season.

We picked out our Christmas tree.

Olaf came along to pick out our Christmas tree.

A new tradition this year is a special Christmas gift from Mama and Daddy that you get to open before we decorate the Christmas tree.  The gift is new Christmas jammies, an ornament for the tree, and a new movie.

As I was taking this picture, you were asking me if you could put your new ornament on the tree.

You were pretty excited for your new movie - Alvin and the Chipmunks.

Hanging up your new ornament - a pink tricycle.

You helped decorate the tree.  Usually, Daddy and I watch National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation while we decorate the tree, but don't think it's appropriate for little ears, so this year we settled on listening to Christmas music.

Hanging last year's ornament - Minnie Mouse.

You were so excited to help Daddy and me hang our ornaments.  It was a little stressful for us though because you were so excited, you were getting a little rough with many of the ornaments.  We finally decided it would be best for you to not get the ornaments out, but instead let me or Daddy get them and then you would help hang them on the tree.  Your reaction for every ornament that we got out was "that's pretty" or "that's so cute"!

Other traditions we hope to do this year are doing an Advent calendar - my plan is to have a Bible verse to read each day and some days have special activities to do, such as bake Christmas cookies or drink hot cocoa.  I also hope to take you to visit Santa (hopefully you won't scream this year), walk around downtown Rochester, MI and look at the "Big, Bright Light show" (all businesses on the main street are covered roof to sidewalk in Christmas lights - it's a beautiful sight to see).  It's so fun to see you enjoying the season.  I look forward to all of our family traditions - both old and new.

Happy Thanksgiving!

We spent the week of Thanksgiving in North Carolina visiting the Taylor family.  It was a fun, relaxing visit and you had a blast playing with your cousins.

We did lots of crafts, puzzles, games, and watched a lot of movies!

playing games on Nana's iPad

We spent a few hours at Monkey Joe's (an indoor inflatable playground) and you had a blast.  Daddy even won you 2 prizes from the claw games - a puppy we named "Husky" and a basketball.  Husky has become your favorite animal!

So proud of your prizes.

Mama & Graecyn selfie

A friend of ours recently opened a biscuit food truck called Wicked Biscuit.  We were hoping to be able to try it out and were disappointed when we learned he wouldn't be out and about until after Thanksgiving...when we'd be back in Michigan.  Uncle Brian is probably their #1 customer and was able to arrange them to come over to their house the day before Thanksgiving and cook just for our family.  It was so nice of him to do and the food was delicious!

 We also did a mini Christmas and you were so excited to get a giant Olaf from Uncle Brian, Aunt Rachel, Anna and Abbie.  They wrapped it with Olaf's nose sticking out of the box and the second you saw it, you immediately knew it was Olaf's nose.  We managed to squeeze it into the suitcase and he's been by your side since we've been home.

 You got to sleep in a big girl (toddler) bed and were so excited and proud of it.

cat nap on the flight home

Trick-or-Treat

You had a great time Trick-or-Treating this year and dressed up as the cutest little Tinkerbell I know.  We went to a business trick-or-treat the week before Halloween at a nearby town and it was great practice (plus, the weather was decent - so much nicer than the weather on Halloween).  You were a little nervous and unsure at first, but once you figured out that you got candy, it was game on.  Plus it helped that your BFF Callie was there too.

Halloween night was cold, windy, rainy and we even saw snow!  We managed to make it to about 8 houses (5 of which we discovered give out full sized candy bars!) and you would have done more if it wasn't so cold.  Callie and her parents were with us, so we called it done and headed inside for soup and playtime.

Patiently waiting for Callie to get to our house.

All bundled up and ready to Trick-or-Treat!

The loot