This Thanksgiving and Christmas Season has flown by so quickly. I have let so many blog worthy events come and go that in order to get myself back on track, I just need to do a quick synopsis and dump a bunch of pictures on the blog. Speaking of which, one of my resolutions for 2013 is to use our actual, real camera instead of my phone. The phone is so convenient, but after looking at all of these pictures, I am kind of disappointed in the quality.
Cate, Timmy and I set out for Chicago the Saturday before Thanksgiving. It is definitely getting easier to fly with them alone. It also helps that in Phoenix, there is a play area in the terminal. It's not elaborate, but compared to them climbing all over the seats, it is great.
One of the main events was making Christmas cookies. It was totally insane. They were both so excited to cut out the cookies and decorate them, that they were going crazy. I eventually had to make a separate staging area just for Timmy so that he would stop laying all over the flour covered table to reach what he thought he needed.
Tim joined us a few days later and we had a relaxing visit at Mimi and Pop's house.
The following weekend it was time for Cate's first dance recital. Her song was "Marshmallow World," so she got to wear a fluffy white costume. Cate did a great job on stage and was so excited to get her flowers when we picked her up after the show.
The very next day, we headed up to Williams, Arizona with our friends Norah and Eli to ride The Polar Express!
Williams is up in the mountains near Flagstaff, so for the first time since we moved here, our winter coats and hats made it out of the closet.
The Polar Express experience is just like the book and movie. We got to ride a train all the way to the North Pole, drink cold hot chocolate, eat cookies and sing Christmas Carols.
When we got to the North Pole, we could see (out the window) Santa's Workshop, his sleigh and all of the reindeer ready to go. Santa got on the train and gave each of the kids a bell to ring.
This is the first year that Cate didn't cry when she saw Santa, but her brother was closing his eyes and also sticking his fingers into his eyeballs to make sure that he didn't see Santa.
After the train ride, we got to have dinner in the lodge and visit with Mrs. Claus. She was a big hit with both kids after she saw them come into the (empty) room and exclaimed, "Oh my! I've been waiting for you two!" Cate was all in after that. They both told her what they wanted for Christmas and colored ornaments for her tree.
We stayed overnight in the hotel and after breakfast the next morning, we headed back home.
Cate and Timmy have both been getting ready for Christmas at school, and Cate's four year old class had a Christmas program. Although Cate wore the same red dress that she wore last year when she was three, her performance was much improved! Last year, she stood on the stage and didn't move a muscle.
This year, she sang all of the songs and did the finger plays without any hesitation. There is such a difference between three and four! Except for her height...which is evidently the same as both of her Christmas dresses from last year still fit.
After the Christmas program, the only thing left to do (other than class parties...) was to get ready to host our first Christmas in our new house. Both of our families were coming, so we had a lot of preparation to do. Luckily, I have two willing "helpers." They were both very intent on cutting out gift tags and Cate wrote all of the names on them for me. Timmy mostly cut up paper.
Our resident party planner was never satisfied with the amount of decorations that we had out, but she was so so excited to do anything Christmas related. Once our oven (which was awaiting repair for 2.5 weeks!!) was fixed, we got right down to business making cookies and treats for our guests.
Ho Ho Ho!
