December Happenings

December has been full of holiday happenings, but it seems my camera didn't make it out of the bag for  most of them, such is life!  

 The library hosted a morning with Santa activity earlier in the month.  Leah met Santa, but wasn't too interested in him, so I didn't get any pictures.  They also had other activities set up, she made reindeer food to spread on the grass for the reindeer (oatmeal and glitter), ate cookies, make a sticker gingerbread house and read books.

 Leah could listen to someone read stories forever and this lady was happy to read to her. 

 I tried to get a few pictures in front of the Christmas tree like last year, but for some reason I didn't have much luck.  I think I was in too big of a hurry.  I might just try again since our tree is still up.  

 I think this is Leah's favorite ornament on our try, it's of a cat.  Unfortunately it was also our first ornament causality, notice the broken tail.  

 We left out cookies for Santa.  I also forgot to take pictures of what Santa left, but Leah got a train set, stuffed Dumbo, monster bowling, and a few other random things.  She liked leaving the cookies out, but when it came time to "see if Santa came", she didn't want to, I think she thought he was still in our living room, ha!

 We also celebrated Christmas with my family.  We tried for some pictures with the girls in their matching shirts my mom made.  I didn't take the time to set my camera, so unfortunately all my pictures turned out blurry or off color.  

 Three cousins showing off their "Hello Kitty" jewelry. 

We're off to celebrate our 2nd Christmas with Tim's family this weekend.  Maybe I'll do a better job of taking pictures!

Christmas Cookies

I knew I couldn't let the holidays pass without making Christmas cookies with Leah. I debated what kind of cookies to do and whether on not to do cut-out cookies or not. I ultimately opted for the easy way and just did the sugar cookies rolled in sprinkles and plain sugar cookies with frosting. I love a good cut-out cookie, but I find they're just so much work and I don't get a lot of return on my time and effort (perhaps I need to learn to streamline the process). I also opted to use the Betty Crocker bagged sugar cookie mix instead of making my own, a friend recommended it to me last year and I might never go back! (Thanks Tina!) I guess I figured I wasn't really interested to how good the cookies looked and tasted, I was more in it for the experience for Leah (and a few cookies to eat and share).