Happy Birthday Jesus!

Christmas cookie time!

 Jeff and Claire worked hard last night making the cookie dough for our Christmas cookies.

 Today Claire and I made our cookies. Claire did most of the work. First she rolled out the dough.

 Then she worked on cutting out pictures and placing the cookies on the baking sheet.

 No cookie is complete with some frosting so next Claire made the frosting.

 She then very carefully frosted the cookies. 

And finally she added her special touch to each cookie with sprinkles! Then we got to sample some. They got a thumbs up from Mommy and Claire! Merry Christmas!

Meeting Santa

 Claire had to practice her smile for Santa while we were waiting for Daddy to get home. This is one of my favorite poses. How did my baby get to be so grown up?

 Looking so beautiful underneath the Christmas tree!

 This is Claire's super excited smile!

 We did not have high expectations when meeting with Santa because every year before this one Claire would grab hold of me with a death grip and start shaking as soon as we got anywhere near Santa. This year we had a wonderful surprise. We talked it up all day long. Claire walked up to Santa holding my hand and as we got closer to him, she started to try to get out of my hold. She hesitantly walked up to him and stood there. I put her into his lap and to my surprise she didn't cry, she even smiled for the picture! We were so very proud of our girl!

The stress of meeting Santa got to Claire and she crashed in the car on the way home!

 

 

Little helper

 Claire started her busy day by helping Mommy get the marinade made for our chicken. She did all of the measuring of ingredients.

 After lots of mixing, she then dumped it over the chicken in the crock pot. Not even one drop was spilled. Claire was very careful!

 After going to look at Christmas lights in the surrounding neighborhoods, Claire got home and wanted to dust. She loves to dust the entire house, including the walls! We don't complain!

 Here Claire is busy with Daddy working on writing her letters and all of our names. She starts by tracing our names and then writing them herself next to the traced name. She is getting better every day with her writing abilities! 

Busy getting ready for Christmas

 Claire brought home from preschool this Santa and cotton balls. Each day she gets to add a cotton ball to his beard. On Christmas day, we will have a full-bearded Santa!

 Our little elf Eddie joined us this year from the North Pole. He likes to hang out in all kinds of crazy spots and this is where Claire found him this morning. Looks like he was busy playing with Claire's jewelry and ended up tangled in the Christmas tree!

 After school today Claire wanted to paint some snowman pictures. She had so much fun picking out which colors to use.

Tah dah! The finished project. Very unique and creative!

Oh My Lord...

Claire must have learned a new song at pre-school. We believe it is suppose to go "oh my lord laying down in bethlehem" but it comes out like "oh my lord, lay down in bed for him".  At least she is paying attention at school.