Christmas!

Since Clara was born, it sometimes seems like holidays or special occasions just sneak up on us, and before we know it, they have come and gone. So we decided to make a real effort to do some things that would help us remember that Christmas was coming, and to enjoy the season a little more.

We made Nutella hot chocolate

We took Clara to see Santa, and she was a perfect doll.  All the pictures turned out fabulous.

The next day, we went and saw Santa again, with Mars this time.  At first, they just seemed kinda confused.

Then Mars decided she did not like Santa at all.  I love this one.  Clara is missing a shoe, Mars is crying, and it's just hilarious.

 Of course, Marseille needed one by herself with Santa.  She was not very happy about that.

 We went to the Dickens Festival during the time that admission was free.  It was basically just a bunch of vendors selling stuff.

They did have reindeer there.

We decorated our tree.  

We ditched our old, lopsided tree when we moved from Philly, so we got a new one this year.  This one has a weird hourglass shape.  No matter how much fluffing and rearranging of branches I did, it still had that shape.  Oh well.  That's what you get for being a cheapskate and buying crappy fake trees.

Decorating the tree is always so fun and sentimental for me. Growing up, we got a Christmas ornament every year that represented the year in some way.  I still have all of those.  We have continued that tradition in our family by buying ornaments as our keepsake when we go on vacation. Here are a few examples.

Cape May, New Jersey

Paris (of course)

The Philly Phanatic

Baltimore, Maryland

We visited Christmas Street.

We enjoyed a fabulous outing with my parents to get Thai food and see the lights on Temple Square.

The big day still came up really fast. On Christmas Eve, we went to my grandma's for a while then we headed to the Noyces for dinner.  We spent the night at my parents so we wouldn't have to drive all the way there on Christmas morning. We started off the day with breakfast then started in on the presents. We took a break to talk to Matthew on the phone, then got back to it.  My parents were so generous and we enjoyed all our gifts.

We spent the afternoon at the Noyces enjoying even more awesome presents, food, and company. We polished off the day at our own apartment having our own little Christmas. It looked like a tornado hit our house after we brought all our stuff home and it took a while to recover from all the fun, but it was so great. I know Clara won't remember this Christmas, but it was fun to make her first one special, if only for my own sake.