The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year...

this is one of my favorite times of year, i guess it probably is for most people.  this year has been especially fun, because we have a very excited toddler in our house.  it is so much fun to have kids during holidays!  we've gone driving around looking at lights, and everything to her is "awesome!".  she points out every snowman, penguin, santa, reindeer, and christmas tree that her little eyes see.  (and continues to tell you until you acknowledge her). 

this will be our first christmas just the three of us.  i was super excited to not have such a long day juggling both of our families.  but, as we get closer, i've gotten a little sad.  i'm going to miss all of the festivities and traditions that we shared with our families (and definitely miss the food!).   but, it's been fun for us to decide what traditions we want to keep and start on our own.

st. nick made a visit to our house on december 6th.  and st. nick also visited gram and gramps, and they made sure to send the goodies along to us.  mae loves her new boots.

and of course he brought christmas jammies!

i love decorating my house for holidays.  its taken me a while to decide where i like things to go in this house.  and of course i find little surprises that mae leaves for me like santa wearing a tiara 

or sleeping beauty and some of the seven dwarfs visiting the nativity.

one of my favorite christmas memories is decorating sugar cookies!  you knew it was the day when you saw the big mixing bowl in the fridge (unless your younger brother then ate the WHOLE bowl of cookie dough and you had to wait another day).  i always knew i wanted to do that with my kids, and i figured this was the year for mae.  boy was i right.  this girl was in decorating heaven.  the mini m&m's were her favorite.  and surprisingly enough, she didn't figure out she could eat them until the very end.

she pretty much decorated all the cookies herself.  she did a good job for a 2 year old.  she did not like mixing the colors of sprinkles or m&m's...ocd much?

and of course we had to watch them bake!

i love our library, they always have lots of fun things going on.  last saturday, they had santa.  so we decided to head over there.  this is mae waiting in line...

 

and this is her when we got to the front of the line...not having it.  she was terrified.  i tried to go with her, nope.  she seriously wanted cody to hold her the rest of the time we were at the library.

 

she still has tears in her eyes in this picture.

not having grown up with girls, and not being the most sensitive girl myself...it has been quite the ride with a girl.  and this is only the beginning!  not sure how two girls, especially when they're teenagers is going to go for me.  luckily i have a husband who is sensitive and the best dad to little girls. i guess Heavenly Father figured as long as they have him for a dad they should turn out okay!