At Annabel’s preschool they had a little fiesta de navidad and a piñata.
She has known most these kids since they were all just babies because I went to preschool with their older siblings.
With Sofia and Elena:
Hitting her first piñata
Happy about the candy
We have been begging my mom for years to make a gingerbread house. Finally she gave in. In her defense, this is the mess we made:
How does this work? First we combined all the pieces then covered the roof in icing. Annabel and I each had a bowl of candy to put on our respective sides of the roof. I couldn’t resist eating a few pieces of candy, but most of it ended up on the roof.
Annie, on the other hand, ate a lot of candy. Here is her side:
At one point, she took a spoon to the roof:
What a fun 15 minute activity that takes an hour to set up for and a half an hour to clean up!
But we had lots of fun and enjoy looking at our final product everyday!
That’s a spoon she’s using to eat sprinkles!
And, yes, my mother recommends using a kit to avoid complete gingerbread distress and to be able to complete this project on a school night.
Last year, my poor mother took 302 pictures for our Christmas card (I actually think she took more over multiple days, but I could only find 302.) She tried to do the card that spelled JOY that you received in 2010, but gave up and did a whole card of outtakes.
Here’s some you didn’t see:
Well, ok, not THE big day. But a big day – we’re off to see Santa! After a failed attempt last Sunday, we’re trying again today. In anticipation, please enjoy this walk down memory lane.
2007 (I was 1 and a half )
2008 (I was 2 and Mom was pregnant)
2009 (I was 3, Annabel 6 months)
2010 (me 4, Annie 1)
Since yesterday was filled with some thoughtful facts about our blog and Christmas, we thought you’d enjoy some more facts about the North Pole.
The North Pole, as you know, is located in the Arctic Region of our planet. There are 8 nations who occupy a piece of the Arctic Circle – United States, Canada, Russia, Finland, Denmark (Greenland), Norway, Iceland and Sweden. That means 2 million people and 50 different languages! I had no idea! That doesn’t include how many elves and Mr. and Mrs. Claus.
Here are a few of my favorite animals that live in the Arctic:
Arctic Fox: 
Arctic Hare: 
Polar Bear: 
And the Reindeer (domesticated caribou): 
During the winter months, vegetation is really scarce in the North Pole – barely a little moss and other fuzzy stuff for the animals to chew on. So most birds and animals migrate south for the winter.
Except, of course, those hard at work at the North Pole. Conner, our Elf on the Shelf, and all his friends the elf, don’t get to enjoy much nature. It pretty much looks like this up there this time of year.
It should be no surprise then that we found Conner enjoying our plants in our house. I said, “He must need some fresh air after spending so much time in the North Pole.” You see, I’m learning about the role that plants play in the environment.
As everyone knows, Santa knows when you’ve been bad or good…etc, etc.
Well, most of the time, we’re pretty good kids.
Sometimes we’re naughty:
And most times nice:
