Our Christmas so far . . .

Chris and I commented yesterday that we are loving our Christmas season so far . . .
We had a fantastic family weekend. On Friday, Hallie and I made Christmas sugar cookies together. It was a fun experience. It took about two hours total. But she alternated sitting on the counter with me or standing on a chair next to me. She loved to hold the measuring spoons and cups and dump the ingredients in when it was time. Always weary of noises, she was worried about my hand mixer at the beginning but she warmed up to it eventually. She told me at least one hundred times "I want to eat it, Mommy," as we were rolling out dough. It was like my very own, live, broken record. One of my favorite parts of the event was letting Hallie pick out what shapes to do next. She would say "um . . . another Christmas tree" or "I want a snowman!" I look forward to many more years of baking together. Hopefully we will make some gingerbread men together this week.

On Saturday we hung out at home and then went to our Ward Christmas Party that evening. Hallie met Santa Clause. It was so hard to wait until 8:30 pm to see him. But it was worth the mini-meltdowns when she finally saw him. He came into the room as we were singing Jingle Bells. She was thrilled and kept repeating "There's Santa Clause! Hi, Santa Clause!" When she sat on his lap she told him "Hi, Santa Clause!" "Merry Christmas, Santa Clause!" When asked what she wanted for Christmas, she replied "I want to go up the stairs!" (All the other kids were climbing and playing on the stairs). When she was presented with a candy cane treat, she said "Thank you for the candy came, Santa." And then we were on our way. On the ride home she kept trying to bite through her candy cane with the wrapper on. It was a very satisfying night as a parent to see our child experience the wonder of Santa.




Yesterday, was a perfect Sunday. We spent time together looking over pictures and talking in the morning. At church, we heard wonderful testimonies and had great lessons. I was so excited to sing the Christmas hymns. I sang them all a tad bit louder than normal. We sang "Hark the Herald Angels Sing" and "It Came Upon a Midnight Clear." It feels so good to sing those great Christmas songs. After church, we took some family photos by our Christmas tree. Then in the evening we went to Judy's (Mom's) house for a wonderful chicken pesto pasta meal. While we were there we listened to the First Presidency Christmas Devotional. It was wonderful and inspiring as usual-- and was centered around the real reason for Christmas: Christ. Hallie got to stay up an hour and a half later on both Saturday and Sunday.

We've only had a handful of snow days so far. But Hallie loves the snow. She wants to play in it all day and inevitably cries when we try to bring her inside. Here are some pictures of her enjoying the "winter wonderland" in our front yard.