December was a busy month for our family, as usual, so I am splitting up the month into two posts. This one will cover December 1st – 23rd, and the next post will cover Christmas Eve through the end of 2018.
December 1st was a busy Saturday for Brooklyn and me. Brooklyn was invited to a birthday party for a boy in her class at school named Easton. The party was at Altitude Trampoline Park. We’d never been there before, but Brooklyn didn’t hesitate to take off and go play with her friends.
Brooklyn had a blast! I’m honestly surprised she didn’t ask to celebrate her birthday at Altitude this year. She loved it! As a sidenote, Brooklyn has gotten invited to a bunch of birthday parties this year for friends from school. It’s interesting for me at these parties where I don’t really know many of the adults or even the parents of the birthday child. I have definitely been forced to come out of my shell this school year and strike up conversations with other parents I don’t know. It’s not my strong suit, but I think I’m getting better!
We had to leave the birthday party early to go to a retirement party for a former co-worker of mine, so Brooklyn ate a quick piece of pizza and had to miss out on cake and watching Easton open his gifts. I was really proud of her for not pitching a huge fit as we were leaving…she is growing up for sure!
We then headed to Logan’s for Jane’s retirement lunch. It was great to see so many of the people I used to work with! (And it helped that they had cake there, so Brooklyn was happy too…haha). It was a busy but fun morning!
We decided to drive through our old neighborhood on Sunday evening (December 2nd). Our old next door neighbor (who tore down our shared fence line without asking…he wasn’t our favorite person ever) was like the Grinch most of the year, but when it comes to Christmas, he turns into this jolly fellow. Every year, his Christmas light display grows bigger. This year the lights covered his entire roof!
He also adds an inflatable or two every year as well. These pictures don’t even do it justice. You can probably see his house from an airplane! We just find it so hilarious that this guy of all people would go all out decorating his house for Christmas :)
Savannah was obsessed with these sunglasses for several days in December. They barely stayed on her face, but that didn’t stop her!
On December 5th, Savannah helped me make cookies for Travis to take a work Christmas party the next day. She is taking after Brooklyn and definitely enjoys baking more than other forms of cooking :)
I am also raising another little helper! Abigail will be up on that step stool stirring the cookie dough before I know it…
I thought it was cute how Savannah lined up some stuffed animals to watch a TV show with her :)
Savannah loves to be the one to open the door and run in first after Abigail is finished with her nap…
On December 7th, we headed to Target for our annual Angel Tree shopping. We adopted 3 girls this year, and Brooklyn and Savannah did a great job of picking out stuff for their aged girl. They also helped pick out the clothes and toys for the 1 year old since Abigail is still too young to give her opinion :) We really enjoy this tradition of shopping for kids in need during the holidays, and I hope it’s something that the girls will remember when they think back to these years!
On December 8th, we went over to the Hesters’ house to eat supper and watch the Polar Express! We always enjoy getting to do this, and this year, Brooklyn and Savannah were definitely enthralled with the movie. They were a little scared during some of the tense scenes, but overall they enjoyed it. Abigail was just happy to scoot around the room and check things out!
The doughnuts after the movie were a big hit too!
Savannah ate the pink icing off the top and left the rest for her daddy to eat :)
Brooklyn drew this picture for Juls Weatherford (her Bible class teacher at the time). It says “Ho ho ho…merry Christmas” :)
December 9th was a big day at our house—we discovered that Brooklyn had her FIRST loose tooth! She had been saying for a couple of weeks that she thought she had a loose tooth, but I never felt it moving. But it was definitely loose by that day. She was so excited and was telling everyone about it at church that evening!
But first, she and Savannah fell asleep on top of me during the evening service! I think that was a first!!
December 10th – My grocery helpers on our trip to Publix :)
This month, Abigail started getting free rides around the house on the little musical car. Savannah loves to push her on the car, and Abigail loves it too. It’s entertaining for both of them…I just have to make sure that Savannah doesn’t start going too fast!
Brooklyn enjoyed wearing lots of Christmas shirts in December. On December 11th, she wanted to dress like a reindeer. We decided that braided pigtails were about as close to antlers as we could get :)
Brooklyn made a behavior chart for Savannah with smiley faces. It says: “What I mean is that Savannah has been kind of good.” Haha!
Daily occurrence: Abigail was here!
I wasn’t sure if we’d be able to walk home from school much as it got closer to Christmas or not. I was afraid it would be too cold outside, but we managed to walk just about every day that it wasn’t raining outside! With enough blankets and layers, it really wasn’t too bad at all.
These floors are always in need of a good cleaning…I just wish that would have been a real mop!
“Hey, Mom….chairs and boxes won’t keep me off the stairs!”
Travis usually reads the girls’ their Bible story at bedtime while I am feeding Abigail and getting her in the bed. I appreciate his help getting everything done in the evenings…we make a good team!
Our new neighborhood gathers donations for the Madison fire department and police department every year before Christmas. This was our first year to participate (I made fudge!). The person organizing the effort invited any families who wanted to tour the fire department and police department to meet on December 15th so that we could go together as a group. We thought the girls would enjoy the tour, so we signed up to go. Brooklyn was excited to sit in the big fire truck!
Savannah was a little more hesitant, especially when the firefighter shut the door :)
The firefighters were great with the kids, and we really enjoyed the tour!
Group picture with all the kids :)
There wasn’t as much to see at the police station, but they did have some soft, snuggly stuffed animals for all the kids!
It was a fun afternoon!
Not too long after we got home from the tours, Brooklyn was eating an apple for snack, and out popped her loose tooth! She was SO excited! We called Paw and Rae Rae to let them know, and she couldn’t wait to put her tooth under her pillow that night :)
The tooth fairy left a dollar that night! (I promise Brooklyn was more excited than she looks here…haha).
I realized that I rarely take pictures of Abigail in the car these days (who has time for that??), so I thought I’d take a few. We were getting ready to move her into a bigger car seat, so she was coming to the end of her time in the infant seat. She was technically over 30 inches at this point, but we hadn’t ordered Brooklyn’s new seat yet to be able to pass down the old one to Abigail…
Cheese!
Abigail figured out what to do with the steering wheel on the cart…it was so cute!
…and she started pushing herself around on the little car with her feet.
She has to be resourceful when Savannah is taking a nap! :)
I am continually impressed by what Savannah can build with Magna Tiles. This was a house she built for her stuffed animals…
…and after that, she built this triangle out of square tiles. All by herself with no help from me!
Brooklyn’s class Christmas party was on December 19th, a few days before Christmas break started. I helped the class room mom plan the party and gather all the supplies. We had a lot of parents come for the party, so that definitely made things easier. We started out the party with a reindeer craft.
Brooklyn is always up for making crafts, so she enjoyed this part for sure!
The kids had a “dance party” while we got everything set up for our next activity—decorating Christmas cookies!
This was the part I was most nervous about—I could just see it turning into a huge mess. But it wasn’t my idea, so I just hoped for the best ;)
The kids had a blast! They had sprinkles and M&Ms to decorate their cookies with, and it was funny to see how each child’s cookies turned out so differently.
So happy!!
After the kids all decorated their cookies, they ate snacks, and that was the end of the party. It was short and sweet (and not nearly as messy as I was afraid of), and it really went well overall!
This girl rarely cleans her plate, but she must have been hungry that night ;)
December 22nd – Brooklyn and Savannah were helping Abigail practice walking :)
Such good big sisters!
Later that day, we went to see the new Grinch movie as a family. This was Abigail’s first time to go see a movie at the theater, and it was only Brooklyn and Savannah’s second time ever (first movie was Finding Dory).
Savannah was GLUED to the screen the whole time…it was hilarious. Both big girls loved the movie, and Travis and I thought it was great too. Abigail did pretty well staying still for most of the movie, so it couldn’t have gone much better!
Eating raisins and driving at the same time…this girl is talented!
I bought a new tree skirt and new bow topper for the tree this year. I always love seeing our tree with a bunch of gifts underneath. I just wish I was better about not waiting to wrap everything until the last minute!
After her class Christmas party, Brooklyn was all about decorating cookies, so I told her we could make some Christmas cookies and decorate them before Paw and Rae Rae came for Christmas.
My helpers!
We frosted and decorated the cookies that night before bed, and it was a messy process. Thankfully the baking sheets kept most of the sprinkles off the floor at least ;)
So many sprinkles!
The cookies may not look too appetizing, but they actually tasted really good. I found a really good sugar cookie recipe online, so I will definitely have to use it in the future if we do this again. It was a fun way to lead up to Christmas Eve and all the festivities to come!
Quotes and Notes: December 1st – 23rd:
- 12/1/18 – Abigail started dancing when some music came on during a commercial during the SEC Championship game. It was her first time dancing that we’ve seen!
- Abigail waves with her whole arm…it’s so cute!
- 12/6/18 – Savannah has started saying “Yes, Mommy.” And “Okay, Mommy” in response to everything I tell her to do :)
- 12/12/18 – Savannah calls Laffy Taffy “Lappy Tappy”
- 12/12/18 – Abigail is now saying thank you! It sounds like “tak you”, but you can definitely understand it. It’s the first “phrase” she’s said!
- Brooklyn was recently telling us about how she learned all about “Roy G Bill” in art class at school…haha
- 12/12/18 – There is a little boy in Brooklyn’s class named Jose who can speak Spanish. Brooklyn told us tonight that Jose lives in Mexico! We told her he must have the longest commute to school of any kid in her class ;)
- 12/14/18 – I told Savannah, “I could just eat you up with a spoon!” She replied, “Noooo—I would fall off the spoon!”
- 12/15/18 – Brooklyn decided to try to stop the van door from closing by sticking her hand in the backside of the door as it was shutting. Her four fingers (all but her thumb) got completely closed in the door. I was already walking into the house when she started screaming at the top of her lungs. It was probably a good 3 or 4 seconds before I could get to the other side of the van to open the door and free her fingers. I know that hurt, but I think it scared her worse than anything. She was using her hand the next day just fine, so we don’t think anything was broken. I’m just glad all her fingers were still attached when the door opened back up! It could have been a lot worse :(
- 12/18/18 – Savannah asks occasionally “How will we get back here after we go to heaven?” “How will we get back to our house?”
- 12/22/18 – Abigail will stand alone without holding on to anything for a few seconds at a time sometimes. I was sitting close to her on the floor in her room, and she took one step toward me and fell into my arms! (12/15/18) The next day, she also took one step toward me at Cici’s house in the kitchen after lunch (12/16/18).
Almost done with 2018 recaps! Next up: Christmas through New Years :)
