California Christmas

Christmas with the girls was a new experience this year! Jenna is old enough to understand about Jesus' birthday and that Santa comes to visit. For weeks, she had been telling everyone that she wanted a princess bike for Christmas. Thank goodness Santa already had that on his list! I was so excited for her to open her princess bike, and I thought she would be too. However, that didn't turn out to be the favorite gift:) Since she opened it on Christmas morning, the Dora umbrella (or rain flower as Jenna calls it) has been the favorite toy. She opens and closes it carefully, watches tv with it open, and goes outside frequently to see if it's raining. Next year--no big fun gifts for her. Just $5 rain flowers:)

Abby enjoyed Christmas as well. In the past week, she has become VERY mobile. She's crawling and climbing all over the place and having fun doing it. When she was first born, I was convinced that she was mellow and reserved. I am very wrong! As she crawls for things she shouldn't have or climbs the fireplace or speakers one more time, she has this little mischievious smile like she knows that she shouldn't be doing it. Even as I write, I hear Nate saying, "Abby--no, no. Don't climb the speakers!" She is elated at her new found mobility and is surely keeping us busy.

Christmas with the girls was such a joy this year, even if we have little redheads with minds of their own!

Bikes and New Friends

This may not be a big deal to most of you, but to me it is absolutely wonderful! We came home from a shopping trip today, to be greeted at the car by four neighborhood girls--all ages 7-9. We've met some of them before, but have never spent a lot of time with them. Of course, Jenna has been asking about them for weeks, but they are in school and we rarely see them outside.

School's out, and they are playing outside. They invited Jenna to ride bikes with them, and she had a ball! We have never lived on a street where Jenna could ride her bike outside with nice little friends (except in Texas, but she was 6 months old then). It was so wonderful to watch her race on her little trike up and down the street with four other little girls who want to be a "mother" to her. Very cute.

She'll be even more excited when Santa brings her a big girl princess bike for Christmas!

We are so happy to live in a safe nieghborhood where Jenna can play and ride her bike outside:)

Gialella

We have a new member of our family! Princess Gialella!

For several days, Jenna talked about Gialella and I just couldn't figure out what that word meant. I finally figured out that not only is Gialella a person, but she is the princess that Jenna turns into sometimes--especially when she is in trouble:)

I also wasn't sure how she came up with that name, but if you break it down it makes sense.

Jenna + Cinderella (her favorite princess) = Gialella :)

Christmas Shopping Craziness

For the first time in years, I've had my Christmas shopping done early. We decided to get Jenna and Abby one bigger type toy and a few small ones. We are really trying to teach Jenna that Christmas is more about Jesus's birthday as opposed to her only focusing on the gifts themselves. It's a hard battle, though.

Today, a few family members and friends gave me money to shop for our girls since we live all the way out here in California. After spending the afternoon in Target and Toys R Us, I am officially dismayed by Christmas materialism and how crazy it makes a person.

I have to admit, going shopping with someone else's money was fun, but I kept thinking to myself that my kids don't need all this stuff and that I was spending too much money. Buying many toys at once makes it seem like a lot, I guess.

Another thing that irritated me today while shopping was the fact that Barbie is really no longer a toy for little girls. When I was little, you could buy a Barbie and find a ton of matching outfits for her--appropriate ones, I might add. I was expecting to walk into the store, pick out a Barbie and find a few cute outfits. I was wrong. You can buy a Barbie, but the outfits are either in a really expensive three or four pack or are inappropriate for little girls to play with. Jenna's only 3! The outfits that went with Barbie made Barbie look like she was 22 going out on the town for the night. I ended up buying a pack with a Barbie and three decent outfits. In the end, I'm sad that Barbie isn't geared towards little girls anymore. Or if she is, I don't want Jenna to think that real girls have to look like that.

We'll keep teaching Jenna about Jesus and that His birthday is the most important part of Christmas, but I've come to learn today that Satan sure is at work during the Christmas season.

At Least She Didn't Throw Up on Santa

This morning, Jenna woke up telling me that her stomach was burning. I didn't think much of it because she often tells me her tummy hurts when she is just hungry. She didn't eat her breakfast, but that's not uncommon for her; I thought she just didn't like the new cinammon raisin bread I just bought. She drank juice and acted just fine on our way to the mall this morning for a fun Christmas event.

Our mall had the coolest event for kids! They got to decorate Christmas cookies, listen to a story that Santa and Mrs. Clause were reading, and dance to some fun music. Jenna was her normal fun, happy self. She even won one of the dance contests! ( Unfortunately, I don't have pictures, because as I took my camera out to take pictures of Jenna in her antler hat and "Santa's Little Helper" red apron, I realized I had left the camera on and the batteries were dead.)

We finish that event and then go over to Santa. We are waiting in line, when Jenna asked me to pick her up. Two seconds after I pick her up, she pukes all over me. All the other moms with their kids take three steps back from me and stare like their kids have never puked on them before. A nice man came over and got me some paper towels to clean up the mess, thank goodness. After about ten minutes of cleaning puke from the floor, changing Jenna's clothes, and trying desperately to get away from the gauking mothers, we rushed home with Jenna not getting to sit on Santa's lap.

The good thing in all of this is--at least she didn't puke on Santa. What a site that would have been!