Twas The Night Before (an Early) Christmas!

Since we are traveling for Christmas this year, we asked Santa if he would mind stopping by our house a bit early this year. He said it would take a little extra effort, but was not a problem and he understood why we wouldn't want to pack all those extra things on our trip!

So, for us, last night was Christmas Eve! I have to admit that it did feel a bit jarring to have it this early, but we made a fun and festive night out of it. The kids are at SUCH fun ages for this sort of magic. I loved it. Join me as I document our Christmas Eve Story 2008:

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First activity was to make chocolate chip cookies for Santa. I did something I don't usually do and I let the girls roll their own cookie balls! They really loved it. You can see Pey in the background....she ate more than she rolled.

Just one of the 75 pictures from Peyton on my camera. This one was actually cute and not of someones toe or ear like all the others!

Had to snap this photo. Peyton is absolutely obsessed with being perched on the counter. Especially if I am baking/cooking anything. The entire time I made the cookie dough, she asked "what's that mom?" and wouldn't stop until I told her the actual name of what I was putting in there (which, I have to add, it must be really confusing to a two year old why I am putting "flowers" (flour) into cookies!). The other thing she is doing in this pic is using a pen inappropriately, which is another one of her obsessions lately.


We watched our Christmas home movies from last year. They loved remembering what they got and seeing how they looked. I think that might be a fun tradition to start.


Of course, they opened their Christmas eve matching jammies. Gotta do that tradition. I got these on clearance last year after Christmas for like $1.50 each set! They loved the bunny on the front.



I have to include this as part of our evening. This sweet little girl below has been acting pre-teen lately to an extreme degree. I seriously need the Supernanny. Anyway, we had a babysitter (Emily) earlier in the day for a while, and apparently Jordyn was rude when Emily told her she wasn't allowed to have our neighbor over to play while I was gone. She did her attitude and backtalking, which I had thought she saved just for Tucker and I. I was really upset when I found this out. But I kept my cool and told her that she needed to write an apology letter to Emily. So she did and we delivered it with some treats to Emily's house!

Here's the note. It's the third draft. The first two, she tried to justify why she was rude! (She wrote "I'm sorry for speaking meanly to you, but I really wanted to have Emma come over and play....". What a stinker!


OK, so we hopped in the car to run a few errands, and most importantly, look at the lights! One of our favorite things to do this time of year. Peyton would be happy if we did this for 7 hours each night.


The girls ran some of their cookies up to one of their favorite Young Women, Silvina.


Then we came home to play a few rounds of our new game! Katie & fam sent us a fun game for Christmas called "Don't Eat Pete". Simple and fun. The girls thought it was really funny. We had to remind Daddy not to yell with too much enthusiasm because it was startling us (and making mommy and Lexi feel grumpy). Fun game, thanks Katie!



This is just a photo of one of my very favorite Christmas Decorations. It lights up, showing the Nativity, and plays "Oh Holy Night" my fav Christmas song.


Time for bed, and time to set out the cookies for Santa!


Santa set up the presents just right and brought the girls their most requested gift....a Baby Alive!


Santa always left me a special note growing up, so I'm glad he does the same for my girls.


This is the baby Alive called "Wets and Wiggles". She moves, coos and pees. Just the thing I want around the house! But the girls....well, this is a dream come true for them. Much more fun than the other 15 dolls we have who don't do anything but lay there.




Done helping Santa....ready for bed. Around midnight, not to bad.




On to the next morning! Peyton got up at 5:00, but went back to bed around 6:00 (just layed in our bed while we tried to sleep, while telling me she "needs" eggies. She got milk instead.). That was the exact time Jordyn got up and layed in our bed. For an hour we told her to stop wiggling, stop figiting, wait for Lexi and Peyton to get up. Anyway, by 7:00 we were all up and ready for fun! The girls were SOOOOOO excited to see their Baby Alive Dolls. Everything else was fun, but more of a formality. It was actually a fairly simple Christmas, but perfect too.


Pey got into the unwrapping this year!


Mommy Mistake: Jordyn and Lexi got the same doll, the Baby Alive Wets & Wiggles. But I told Santa that Peyton was little and didn't need the elaborate one, so she got on that opens and shuts her eyes when you turn the bottle. Funny that I did that because I learned long ago that you triple it, or you don't get it at all! So we spent the day with the older girls crying to me "Mommy, Peyton won't give me my Baby Alive!". Who wants to fight with a two year old all day long everyday? Plus, to give Pey some credit, their dolls were really fun how they talk and wiggle.

So, after the girls went to bed, Tucker went to KMart and exchanged Pey's simple doll for the "real thing". So tomorrow we will officially have THREE Baby Alive Dolls crying, peeing and wiggling around our house! Glad I don't have a real one to add to the mix.....I think I would have to take the batteries out of theirs!

It was a fun early Christmas eve/day. And we have a few more celebrations to look forward to still! I love making things magical and memorable for the girls. (I also love Amazon, and online shopping more than I can explain).