Holiday Happenings, Week 3

Merry Christmas eve, eve, eve! Three days till Christmas and I gotta say I'm ready. Shopping is done and presents are mostly wrapped. Cards are finally in the mailbox. Cookies have been baked. Family is arriving this evening and we're enjoying a quiet few days before the madness of the weekend hits us. A good kind of madness, but madness all the same since we'll be driving all over the place. In the meantime, here's a bit of the festive happenings going on over here. 

We haven't done a ton of baking this season but it's just not Christmas without sugar cookies. This is by far my number one holiday treat going all the way back to when I was Ez's age. The dough, the decorating, swiping licks of frosting, overloading on more sprinkles than one cookie can possibly hold...I LOVE it! And so does Ez. He was a perfect little helper this year from dough mixing to sprinkle topping. As a reward for his efforts he got to lick the frosting off two cookies. One day he may come around to liking a bit of cookie with his frosting, but for now just the frosting will do. Declan was curious about the whole process, but after I told him no to throwing the sprinkles on the floor, stealing the unfrosted cookies, and trying to fling frosting all over the walls he gave up and wandered off to do his own thing. 

We made sure to box up and deliver a few to the employees at our local motorcycle dealership. Nine times out of ten Ez would rather go there than the playground and they are so nice about letting us wander throughout the store with our stroller while Ez touches all the headlights and handlebars and he and Declan take a seat in the fancy Batmobile looking vehicle. I'm sure they could've kicked us out and told us not to touch anything but they're so nice instead. Until the day we push all the motorcycles over domino style, anyway ;)

While Joe and I were off having our own festive fun in Sacramento the grandparents and uncles were busy holding down the fort. My mom boldly declared on Facebook that she had toddler-proofed their tree. To give her credit she did do a good job with all the bows and paper ornaments. But Declan loves nothing more than a challenge. He walked right through the door, straight to the tree, and yanked the lights up hard enough to send the angel on top flying. He and Ez spent the next few days systematically removing all the ornaments and trying to chew through the lightbulbs. Unfortunately there is no such thing as a toddler proof tree. And there's definitely no such thing as a Declan proof tree. 

When Joe and I got back to town we all took an evening walk through my parents' neighborhood to check out the decorations. There were so many great lights and music and they even had Salvation Army at the end of the block handing out candy canes. A nice Christmasy end to our weekend getaway. 

For the past few years Ez and I have been making salt dough ornaments for our tree. So far we've made mini Christmas trees, handprints, and this year we did thumbprint hearts. The Pinterest version had actual fingerprint grooves and everything. How they pulled that off I have no idea. Most of our don't even look like thumbprints so you'll just have to take my word that that's what they are. 

I'm so so SO excited to see Ez and Declan's faces come Christmas morning. I don't think either of them really know what's in store for them so it's going to be a total surprise when they walk downstairs and see presents under the tree. Part of me can't wait and part of me wants to drag this holiday season out just a bit longer. I'm sure I say this every year but it flew by way too fast!

Hope you and your family have a cozy festive weekend planned and that none of you are stuck in long lines doing last minute shopping.