Sisters

It's a good thing my suitcase doesn't have a millimeter of spare room in it - if it did the girls would be trying to convince me to fit Grandpa's rocking horse in it. They like it so much they even concede to sharing it once in a while because neither wants to wait for a turn.



Or maybe it's not the rocking horse specifically - maybe they just like rides. They were extremely excited to get to ride this Christmas train together at the mall yesterday. They even got to sit in the front car and ring the bell the whole time.




And did you notice Catherine's hat? She picked it out at the mall. She's very focused on defining her own personal style right now.

Christmas, Round 2

We had Christmas Round 2 with Dema, Grandpa T, and Aunt Mel yesterday. There was a lot of cooking, playing playdough, toy trains, some Charlie Brown, and of course presents. I'm honestly feeling in a little bit of a vacation fog, so in lieu of my usual witty banter I'm just going to toss up some pictures. Sorry, I'm getting lazy in my old age.

Playdough time:




Presents!



Hanging out:




And these are from earlier in the day or the night before:





Christmas Rounds 3 and 4 are later this week... yippee!

Queens of the Kitchen

We had Christmas morning this morning at Grandma and Grandpa's house, and I don't have any pictures of present opening. I'm sorry - I was laughing so hard the whole time I couldn't take any pictures. And when I wasn't laughing I was furiously trying to untwist the 428 twist ties holding all the new toys in their packaging while two whining toddlers jumped up and down in front of me clapping their hands (clapping hands makes parents move faster - every child knows that). But the girls had a very fun morning. Catherine was rendered speechless on more than one occasion, and that is a sight to see.

I did find time to play with my camera while Catherine and Mary were helping Grandma make dessert for dinner tonight. Grandma claims that they really were helping in the beginning, but by the time I made it into the kitchen it was all taste-testing.






Despite the amount of chocolate they appear to have consumed today, both girls are now sleeping peacefully, each with a new Dora doll on the pillow next to her.

The First Pics

Michael had my Christmas gift waiting here when we arrived yesterday (it was a good trip by the way - the girls were great) - a "real" camera, as in one where I can put it on manual and switch out the lenses and have nothing to blame for the bad pictures except my complete lack of photography talent. My point-and-shoot is one of the best, but in the winter when most of our pictures are inside, the flash just can't keep up with the girls!

Here are my very first efforts from the Christmas family gathering last night. I just turned it on and started hitting buttons... clearly a read through the manual and some practice is in order, since these are the only salvagable pictures out of about 80 shots, but it was quite fun (as was the family gathering).

Can you guess what happened next?


If you see me wearing the same pair of pants this entire trip, it's because Catherine usurped all my suitcase room by insisting we bring all the girls' special Christmas outfits to wear while we are here.



"T!"


I'm sure a lot more happened during the party, but the girls and I fell asleep at 8 (something about that 4am wake-up to catch our plane and too much excitement to get in a decent nap... we needed to catch up a bit). Of course now we're the only ones awake, but the girls are doing a surprisingly good job leaving the mountain of presents alone until everyone else wakes up.

Merry Christmas!

Christmas Eve!

We have a long day and an early morning, but we can't wait to see everyone!
Merry Christmas Eve!

House Church

Sunday we had to cancel church because of the snow, so instead we said morning prayer as a family at home. Catherine and Mary are now obsessed with praying. Even after we had finished the morning prayer liturgy, Catherine just kept insisting that we turn to certain pages and say more prayers. I really just have to let the videos speak on this one.









The next night they made him say evening prayer before bedtime.

Round Two

We made an effort to get out in the snow again today, but really didn't last very long. It was sunny, but windy and really much to cold to be out. Catherine still thought it was pretty neat - here are a few pictures of the snowballs all bundled up.

A Friendly Little Blizzard

Well, aside from our little snowstorm annihilating Michael's strict "no cancellation" policy when it comes to church, we're not really much worse for wear here. We're probably not going anywhere today, and Michael and Brian probably both have sore backs from shoveling, and Kristin and Brian may or may not run into some trouble with their flight home tomorrow, but you know, mostly we're all just fine and dandy for a couple feet of snow!

I did let Catherine talk me into taking them outside for about 12 minutes yesterday afternoon while Daddy was digging out the cars before they turned into frozen car ice sculptures, but the sun was going down, the wind was blowing, and it was darn cold, so I don't have much in the way of stories or pictures.

The unshoveled and undrifted snow was up to about their waists.


I think if we plopped Mary down in the yard her head would go under.

This pile is over Catherine's head.


This morning broke clear and sunny, but it's still windy and in the 20s, so I don't know if we'll get out or not. Here are the few pictures I could get without getting frostbite.

The kids' outdoor toys:


Snow and icicles hanging off the back of the house:



The view out the front window. If you look closely next to the pine tree on the left, you can see the mailbox is about a foot above the snow.

Daddy's Little Angels

Last night before the snow came we had our little church Christmas party at the house, complete with children's Christmas pageant. This year Catherine and Mary were both angels (a step down for Mary from baby Jesus last year, but she seemed pretty pleased with it). Actually, it's a stretch to say they were angels "in" the pageant... they were more like angels "in proximity to" the pageant, as they both chose to make a very brief appearance next to Mary and then just sit on Daddy's lap on the sidelines for the rest of the play.





After the play Catherine took it upon herself to take care of baby Jesus.

A Blizzard?

There's something like 12+ inches of snow outside. It's hard to tell exactly because the wind is blowing so much that some places have feet upon feet.

When Catherine saw the snow this morning she said, "I was talking about snow yesterday and now there is snow!!" I think she somehow thinks she willed the snow into being.

There's no way we're going out today, but hopefully we will get some playing-in-the-snow time when the wind dies down a bit tomorrow (there's still near-blizzard wind today).

Here's a little peek:

Chef Christopher

Christopher was starting to get really jealous of the girls always getting to sit on the counter to help me cook, so he decided he would help his daddy make tortillas the other night. I think Uncle Brian was wishing he had two or three more hands in order to keep Christopher in line (or at least on the counter) and still be able to roll out the tortillas, but it must have worked out in the end because they were really delicious.

Peek-A-Boo

Mary is in another phase of thinking peek-a-boo (and hide-and-seek) is really hilarious. It gets a little sketchy when she pulls a blanket over her head and starts running around the house looking like Cousin It (and running into walls and furniture), but she has some pretty good "surprise" faces.







Here it is in video, and if you listen closely at the end, you get a "truck" reference.