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This year we stayed close to home while celebrating Christmas. We checked out the local church’s nativity walk through just like we have every year since Leah was a babe. (I forgot my camera.) Instead of venturing into the big city, we checked the newspaper for some local houses that had impressive light displays.

The pictures don’t do their displays justice at all. It was fun to walk around and see all the lights and other additions to their front yards. Look how small Leah is compared to the big castle.

We had Christmas eve with my family at our house this year. It was busy but turned out very well. Leah received this sweater and decided she wanted to wear it the rest of the night. She enjoyed giving out the presents as well as opening up hers.

On Christmas day we left her present from us under the tree as she was still so excited about her other gifts. It was funny to watch her play. She would start with one toy and play for a few minutes and then look up and notice another new toy and would repeat the same scenario over a few times while cycling through her new toys. She loves this suitcase and asked to go bed with it. She specifically wanted it to lay on top of her bum as she was laying down so that is how she fell asleep on Christmas eve night.

On Christmas morning we made waffles with whipped cream for brunch. Leah loves to help in the kitchen. On Christmas day we visited Morgan’s mom’s house. Leah likes to listen and watch their Christmas music boxes.

After Leah woke up from her nap on Boxing day, we showed her the lone present under the tree. Today, the day after Boxing day, we had a nice and quiet day cleaning the house and getting back into our normal routine.

Decorating with Leah around is a lot of fun. I put some Christmas ball ornaments in a glass container and hung up some snowflakes in the bathroom and Leah was so excited. She exclaimed to everyone that it was snowing in our bathroom.

I kept our decorations pretty simple this year. Leah’s Christmas artwork is scattered around on the house on various walls. I cut some greens from the backyard for the mantle and put up our little nativity set. Leah can see it from the dinner table and asks who the specific people are.

Though I generally like to keep crafts pretty simple with the kids in charge of most of the process, during Christmas time I have been doing some artwork that is a little more complicated. These first two crafts I did in the first few years of elementary school and doing them with Leah brought back childhood memories.

The first one is made by saving old Christmas cards and cutting the front page out into circles before gluing three of them together with ribbon in the middle. The second one is made by colouring a picture with felt markers and then painting with canola oil and bordering with black paper. The oil lets the light shine through just like a stained glass window. This was the first time Leah has used markers.

I covered a few of our picture frames with paper and let the kids colour and glue Christmas pictures all over them. I also made hand print wreaths with the kids. Leah wouldn’t let me paint her hand last year put this year she was more excited about the prospect.

I never had a stocking growing up but decided to make one last year while my sister was making one at my mom’s house. Between that stocking and Leah’s one from last year and the one she made this year, our mantel looks very Leah-centric. I hope to do one every year with her to see how her art changes. Last year I remember it being so much effort trying to glue anything with the kids. This year I let them have had it on their own as they are all getting pretty proficient with glue sticks.

Because of this book, she now loves mermaids and will pick her mermaid puzzles over all of the others.

I may have gone to town with Christmas baking this year…

We had our extended family Christmas get together at Morgan’s mom’s house last weekend. We brought some gingerbread houses Morgan carefully constructed with graham crackers so the kids could decorate them. As Leah gets older, it is so much fun to see her participating in more and more activities. I wasn’t sure how well she would do or her interest hold up but was happy to see she did most of it herself while sitting on Morgan’s lap.

On Sunday evening we went out to a Christmas parade in Cloverdale. We sat on a blanket on the roadside while eating our dinner as we watched the semis and other participants go by.

Last weekend we met up with a mommy friend to check out the local Christmas festival. There wasn’t much for the kids to do in the morning but we still enjoyed looking at Christmas decor and checking out the vendors. They did get the ‘train’ up and running before we left which the kids thoroughly enjoyed. We also did got some errands done together which was great.

We have been busy doing Christmas baking. Leah likes to help me which works out very well. It keeps her happy and busy while I’m getting stuff done.

Morgan snapped a few pics of Leah while he was between stages of putting together gingerbread houses.

And last but not least, funny, fish faces.