A Merry Christmas was had by all!

Christmas Eve at great-grandma and great-grandpa Durren's house:

Christmas morning at our house:
Christmas evening at grandma and grandpa's house:
= 2 tired parents:
(more Christmas pictures on flickr!)

Handmade Christmas

So this Christmas I tried to make as many gifts as I could by hand. Here are a few pictures, and my list:
-24 bottles of vanilla extract (made with Meagan, 12 for my family/friends and 12 for hers!)
-24 fabric gift bags
-painted/appliqued pillowcase for John
-a lot of felt play food for Jack & Ruby and a set for Meagan's boys
-2 sets of wooden peg dolls for Olivia and Jack of all of our family members, with felt bags for storage
-smockets for Ruby & Alex
-9 fabric napkins for my mom
-framed embroidery for Jason
-framed embroidery for Sarah
-seasonal word blocks for Sarah
-baby doll for Olivia

is that it? really?

Happy Winter Solstice (yesterday!)

from my window (yesterday)

from Meagan's back porch (last week)

Ruby

silly Ruby


sillier Ruby

Ruby looking out at the snow

pretty Ruby

Almost done!

I'll let you know when I'm out from under the pile of almost-finished Christmas gifts. You can see my list on the corner of the table (but don't look too closely, you might be on there!). Only 4 things left to finish! And an idea for another thing to make for the kids..... Help, I can't stop myself!!!!

Preschool Christmas Party

Jack had his Christmas party at school this week. I had a planetarium show to do that morning, so I missed most of it, including his visit on Santa's lap. I guess he was the first one up on Santa's lap, and would've love hanging out there all day. It's the third time that he's visited Santa already this year-- he sure loves Santa! The kids made cute reindeer hats and nice ornaments.Then parents got to watch the kids swim. Jack has really developed into a great little swimmer. He still isn't crazy about getting his fact wet, though. He's in the half of his class that swims down to the deep end, and then jumps into the water. You should see him try and jump in without getting his face wet, it's pretty funny. Then the kids got to jump in off the diving board, which Jack decided not to do. I think he realized that there was no way he could do that without getting his face wet.

Advent

We are anxiously awaiting Christmas in the Francis home. My mom got the kids an advent calendar that has little wooden figures for each day-- it's been fun for the kids to play with, and a great visual to see how many days are left until Christmas. Jack spent the first week or so before we had the calendar asking, "Is it Christmas?" every morning. I think that the calendar has helped him see that Christmas is slowly approaching. Ruby loves the wooden figures too (of course she does, they are animals!).

The kids just had some great Christmas pictures taken-- I'll be sure to scan them and put them up soon! (Please excuse the crumbs and dirty table!)

part of me

cookies

I spent today baking these delicious Chewy Ginger Molasses cookies for a Cookie Walk at church tonight. I came home with dozens of different Christmas cookies, all very delicious. I also came home to five boys hungry for said cookies. Who can deny five starving little boys their long anticipated cookies, even if it is nine o'clock at night? Well, I guess I should have. Here is what happens when Jack has cookies at nine o'clock:



(sorry, you have to turn your head to watch, but it's totally worth it)

first steps

sorry, now you have to turn your head the other way!

loving

I've been wandering around the internet a lot lately, looking for Christmas ideas. If you haven't been, you have to wander around etsy.com and look at the beautiful handmade items. My cousin has a shop, called Binky Bird, where she sells her beautiful knit designs. Here are a few etsy shops that I would love to spend a lot of money in.....

beautiful prints at the yumi yumi shop

great scarfs at Pretty Racoon

very warm looking cowls at Tea with Toast

too cute kids clothing at charlieandsarah's shop and wide eyed musings

jewelry at Delias Thomspon

geez.....

I know I haven't been very good about posting lately. The thing is, I don't like to post unless I have at least one picture to put up, and I haven't been taking many lately. We've been busy preparing for Christmas, putting up decorations and the tree, counting down the days with our Advent calendar, and I've been working on Christmas gifts. My to-do list is slowly getting checked off-- I still need to get a Christmas-card-worthy picture of the kids. Enjoy the snow, everyone!