christmas day

wow. what a busy day we had. hosting christmas is really a lot of work. i was a crazy person on christmas eve trying to finish all the wrapping, setting up, cleaning, and cooking. i only got two hours of sleep.

i was super happy that i got the house looking so beautiful for christmas morning. i really wanted to get some good pictures to capture the moment. i didn't get any good pictures though. miles forgot to charge his camera battery and my camera kind of sucks so all i have are some blurry photos that i took and a couple from later in the day with miles' camera. i think i should have asked for a good camera from santa.

we did have a really nice christmas though. miles' mom spent the night on christmas eve so she was here to watch the kids open their gifts from santa. mason got a lego queen anne pirate ship, dahlia got a pink big wheel, and connor got a cute little red tricycle.

my family came over around one o'clock. it was nice to have them come over a little later and not worry about serving breakfast to everyone. we all exchanged gifts with each other and then we made a super yummy dinner. beef tenderloin, broiled salmon, au gratin potatoes, green beans, and salad. for dessert my mom made her delicious blinchiki and the boys brought some pie. everything was so good.

i loved having christmas at my house. it is so fun to have everyone over. of course i really hope i can soon learn the art of entertaining and enjoying the party at the same time instead of running around like a crazy person. merry christmas.

christmas elves

yay. the christmas cards are done. true to our tradition of procrastination we sent them out on the 22nd. i had to get up crazy early to print, cut, and label them. i don't think i am going to do it this way next year. i think i might use a service like shutterfly or something. it is just too much work.

the theme for the cards this year was going to be elves working in a toy shop. inspired by my favorite christmas movie elf. i bought these cute matching elf pajamas for the kids and we set up a photo shoot at home to look like they are working in a toy shop. this did not work out at all. none of the photos looked right and i never found all the props i wanted to use like a jack in the box. luckily in between me setting up the next toy making shot miles had the kids sit in front of the fire and just took some candid shots of them together. long after the kids were asleep and miles and i went through the photos it became clear that my idea wasn't going to work. i was so happy to see that we had a really great picture of the three of them that we could use for the cover instead. i think this is the only picture we have ever taken where all three kids are smiling. i love it. i also like that you can see they are wearing matching pajamas. miles did the cute little illustrations for the frame and that was it.

the whole process took so much longer this year. i thought i would have them in the mail on tuesday but here it is already thursday before they went out. oh well. at least we did it!

photos by the fire

miles took some pictures of the kids sitting by the fire during our christmas card photo shoot last night. the photo shoot did not go exactly as i had envisioned it (it never does) but we did manage to get a great photo to use for the card. here are some of the photos we didn't use.

tree topper

we finally got around to putting the star on the top of our tree. dahlia wanted to wait for daddy to be home to help her do it. so sweet.

visit with santa

today i met jen in orange county after mason got out of school. we wanted to take the kids to visit santa. ugh. the visit to santa is always so stressful for me. i almost never get a good picture. there is at least one child that doesn't want to sit with santa. this year it was connor that was most afraid. i did get him to sit on santa's lap for a little while before he decided that was not where he wanted to be. mason was good but he kept making these strained smiles that looked terrible. i actually had to go through the line again and try to get a better picture the second time. they did turn out better but i still think it is not a great picture. i don't think i will be handing these out to friends and family.

at least they got to tell santa what they wanted for christmas. a big wheel for dahlia and a queen anne's revenge lego set for mason. connor kept his wish a secret.

picking out a tree

today was busy. we are definitely in the middle of the christmas rush. so many things to do. i love all the excitement. miles and i took the kids out this afternoon to pick out a tree. we always go to home depot. the trees are not very expensive and we can always find a good one. the down side of not going to a tree lot is that the trees are usually all tied up and bunched together so you have to cut the strings off and fluff out the tree to see what it really looks like. it is very much a help yourself situation. we usually make miles show us at least three before we find a good one.

it was nice to go during the day. the weather was mild and the kids were having so much fun looking at all the trees. we are usually freezing when we pick out our tree. of course we didn't have time to decorate it yet. it is in our living room all green and ready to be trimmed with lights and ornaments. waiting for some love. hopefully we will get to do that tomorrow.

the soda shop

i took the kids to our favorite christmas party. miles decided he wasn't feeling well so he skipped it this year. i didn't mind going by myself. i met my family there and had fun talking to everyone. the kids were excited to see their cousins and run around.

the party is held at our friend's car shop and they have a bunch of little rooms filled with memorabilia so that they look like little movie sets. all the kids loved playing in the fake soda shop pretending to eat plastic ice cream sundaes and pancakes. after the soda shop we moved next door to the fake saloon and the kids played the piano and put nickles in the slot machine. there was tons of yummy food although i think mason and dahlia only ate the cookies. we didn't stay too late but the little ones all fell asleep during the ride home.