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Joel loves bath time. You really have to watch him now that he can pull himself up to a stand as he tries to do it in the bathtub.

Leah helping melt chocolate to dip our Christmas cookies into.

Joel loves to crawl with this play pot lid in his mouth. It is hard to get a good picture of Joel and Leah now that Joel is crawling.

Some Christmas pictures with almost the whole family.

Joel and Leah love to ‘drive’ in the Home Depot carts together. The carts are a beast to maneuver but shopping is so much easier when they are both contained and entertained.

Leah had her preschool Christmas presentation today. She did great, singing and doing all the actions on cue. She takes her role very seriously.

Jingle bells!

We decorated an ice cream cone Christmas tree after the mini concert.

Leah and I made this countdown Christmas chain together. She is so excited about Christmas this year and I love it. She glued most of the links herself and cuts one off every morning. She remembers lots of details about Christmas last year, like Grandpa delivering our tree in a trailer and we had to cut off the top because it was hitting our ceiling. I asked her if we get presents on Christmas and she said, “no, that’s silly, we don’t get presents on Jesus’ birthday”. She is was so excited because she thought lots of friends were coming over (including baby Jesus) to have a birthday party for him with cake and presents. We are going to do a birthday cake for Jesus, though I told her baby Jesus wouldn’t be able to attend in the flesh.

A little random, but here is Joel experiencing his first teeth brushing session.

Leah and I decorated a gingerbread house at Grandma Fran’s house while Joel played with toys under the table.

Joel was fascinated by the train going round and round the Christmas tree.

Here’s Joel checking out our tree. I was so sad to not get a tree from a tree lot this year and more specifically my grandpa’s tree lot. He passed away soon after Leah was born. I have so many memories from hanging out at the tree farm and searching the acres for the perfect tree, drinking hot chocolate and talking by the fire, giving out candy canes to the kids and earning a few tips by helping carry trees out to vehicles. My grandpa would have loved to see Leah roam around the farm and her excitement at the whole experience.

Morgan tied the tree down while I took a few pictures of the kids. Joel isn’t very mobile while in his snowsuit.

Leah put on the some of the lower Christmas lights herself. I can’t express how excited she was about putting up, lighting and decorating the tree. Joel watched from the excersaucer and the floor was full of ornaments, tree needles and lights. I don’t think there will be any presents under the tree with him around this year.

Finishing up.

And on another random note, I asked Leah what she would think if I put Joel to bed in her room. She replied excitedly, “Mom, when he cries you can just come downstairs and give me the soother and I’ll give it to him”. I did put Joel in her room and discovered at two in the morning that Leah can sleep through excessive, loud crying. Gives me great hope for room sharing in the future.

We went to visit my Mom at work and see the farm all decorated up for Christmas. Grandma gave Leah a gingerbread cookie and we got to go on a horse drawn wagon ride.

The farm seems so peaceful with a blanket of snow.

We went to back to my mom’s house where Leah played outside with my mom in the snow. The following week Morgan and I were teaching Sunday school and telling the story of how an angel came to visit Mary. There were wooden blocks to build Mary’s house, some animal costumes for the stable and playdough to make angels out of. When asked what an angel looks like, Leah immediately went on the ground and showed her friends how she made her snow angel and explained that that is how angels look. There isn’t a lot of talk about angels around our house I guess. I struggle to explain how angels look as I’ve never seen one.

Leah and Joel have been interacting more since he’s found new freedom in crawling. Joel looks across the room, sees something he wants, gets really excited (breathing faster and making excited noises) and then starts crawling with great anticipation. He isn’t upset yet if you take something away from him.

He puts anything and everything into his mouth. On the second picture, Joel has just the end of the string in his mouth. Joel got his second tooth a week ago Wednesday.

Leah and I have been working on some Christmas cards. This is her smile for the camera.

Joel puts these fridge magnets in his mouth a lot and then crawls all through the house. A few of them have been dropped down the stairwell.

Leah had her November presentation at preschool on Tuesday. She was very serious and made sure she followed everything the teacher was doing and saying to them. I love to watch her and her whole class perform.

Attempting to get a nice picture of Leah and Joel.

The other day, I was hanging out in the kitchen with Leah and Joel putting together some gingerbread houses. I had Joel’s chair next to me (which has been deeply coveted by Leah) but had put Joel on the floor to crawl around. Leah wanted to go in it so she asked Joel if she could. She continued this conversation, answering for both her and Joel, with Joel’s voice being very high pitched. It continued like this:
-No
-Joel, but I really want to sit in your chair.
-No, I won’t let you sit in my chair.
-Mommy, Joel won’t let me sit in his chair.
I answered saying I do not break up fictitious arguments as I lifted her up into Joel’s chair.