Day 8 - Can you see the reindeer?

Our Day 8 activity was a reindeer craft. I traced one foot of each of the kids and their hands. They then got to color in the faces. Colin took direction pretty well and made a recognizable face. Eli, I think, was going for a more abstract look. Very artistic indeed. I think these might be slightly more recognizable as reindeer then our Halloween ghosts and spider with the emphasis on slightly... maybe not. At least the process of making the reindeer was unanimously enjoyed by both kids. That's good enough for me!

Day 7 - Jingle Bells, The Grinch, and Baby Jesus

Our Day 7 activity was to get out all of our Christmas books and read them together. Eli's favorite by far is a Jingle Bells book that plays music when you open it up. Colin I think is split between "How the Grinch Stole Christmas" and "Follow the Star", which is book about Jesus' birth. He wanted to reenact both stories which is how I know he really liked them. Unfortunately I did not get any pictures of the reenactments which included a very tall snowy mountain and Colin morphing between Mary and Joseph, but I did get one of Eli. I finally found something that will keep him still.

Day 6 - Santa Craft

This one was a hit!

Day 5 - A Delicious Decoration

Today we decorated a gingerbread house as our Day 5 activity. We've decorated one for the past few years and it's usually Chris and I who do most of the decorating. This year, however, Colin decorated almost the entire house by himself. I think Eli got a few pieces of candy on there too but all I handled was the frosting while Chris manned the camera. He took his job very seriously and definitely had a specific idea of how he wanted it to look. I think he did a great job!

Day 4 - Hanging Lights or Everything's More Fun with Daddy

I swear, it doesn't matter what the kids do, if Daddy's involved, they have a great time. Take hanging the outdoor Christmas lights. One wouldn't think it would be that exciting for the kids since they can't really get up on the ladder and hang the lights, but Colin was thrilled! He did climb the ladder under Daddy's watchful eye (maybe that's why Daddy's more fun than Mama) but he mostly just ran around and pretended to do whatever Chris was doing.

Eli wasn't really interested in what anyone else was doing, but he was super excited to be outside riding in his fire engine.

Unfortunately his mittens were getting in the way of all the fun. I told him he needs to get over that if he wants to play outside this winter. 

My boys. :)

Day 3 - A Letter to Santa

Our Day 3 activity was writing a letter to Santa. I thought the kids would be excited about this one. Last year, Colin had a blast writing to Santa and for the last several weeks he has been pouring over every catalog that enters our house pointing out everything he wants. Well, I was half wrong. It was like pulling teeth to get Colin to participate and I did resort to telling him that if Santa doesn't know what you want, you might not get anything. Yes, I can be an evil, horrible parent. I know. Well, that did it and he got down to scribbling what he wanted and later dictated to me a few additional items. Surprisingly after he was done and it was Eli's turn, he got very possessive about the letter and didn't want Eli to write on it. Gosh, I sure love the 3's.

Eli, in contrast to Colin, had a blast writing his part of the letter to Santa and cried when it was time to put the markers away. Of course, this was after he had started writing on our walls for the split second my back was turned. I never had these problems with the other one. Maybe the moodiness isn't so bad. ;)

A Turkey Craft, Teddy Returns, and A New Christmas Tradition (? if mom doesn't lose her mind)

Oh how I have fallen behind...again. Here's an attempt to jam the last 5 or 6 posts I've meant to do all into one.

Right before Thanksgiving, Teddy returned to our home. When I picked Colin up that day, as soon as the car door closed, he began insisting that we get Teddy out of the bag because he missed him so much and Eli started yelling "Ted-dy, Ted-dy". Yessss. That bear went everywhere Colin went. He jammed out with the boys to "Hey Soul Sister" (by Train) and ate every meal with my little man. I also had a fun activity already planned that we decided to document with Teddy, pinecone turkeys! I think this craft actually turned out pretty cute (despite the missing acorn feet). So cute, in fact, that the next night I made 11 more to use as table decorations at the TPG holiday party. Which was a blast, as always. I sure do love those mamas and their families.

Speaking of turkeys, the fam and I had a nice Thanksgiving. We celebrated with Grammy and Poppy this year. We're all thankful for the usuals (family, friends, health, work, etc), but I feel particularly thankful that we didn't spend the entire week of Thanksgiving in the hospital with Eli. It's crazy to think it's been a year since his last surgery. He's doing so great and it's amazing what modern medicine can do.

Costume Colin made in school.

On to the next holiday - Christmas! So, I've decided to attempt 25 different holiday activities for the month of December. I'm not sure which is crazier, the fact that I want to do a different holiday activitiy everyday during what seems to be the busiest time of year, or my intention to blog about it everyday. Let's face it, two posts in one week is good for me. I don't think it's a good sign that it's only Day 2 and I'm already behind. I guess you've gotta start somewhere. My plan is to write a Christmas activitiy on a piece of paper and put it in our advent calendar. The kids get to open a door everyday but instead of candy, they get to find out what our Christmas activitiy is going to be. Yippee!

On the first day, the boys helped me hang decorations on our windows. We had already decorated our tree, but let's be perfectly honest about this. I don't really let them help me decorate it (yet!). Eli kept taking all the ornaments apart and Colin put all the ornaments on one square foot section of the tree. That evening, as soon as he was tucked into bed, I promptly redistributed the ornaments he hung to the rest of the tree. I felt a little guilty because he seemed really proud of his handy work, but I warned him that if he didn't spread them out himself, that I was going to do it for him. The next morning he didn't really seem to mind and said he thought the tree looked great. Phew!

With the window decorations, on the otherhand, I let them go to town. They can put them wherever they want and they can rearrange them all month long. Much more fun for them and less expensive for me if they mutilate them.

Our Day 2 activity was making paper snowflakes. I thought it would be a great opportunity for Colin to practice his scissor skills, but it turns out that it's actually pretty hard to cut through construction paper that's been folded so many times. He gave it a good shot but I did most of the cutting. He did enjoy gluing and glittering the snowflakes. Eli got to play with our scraps because, well, he's 1 and can't use scissors and I'm not crazy enough to let him get near the glitter. He looks thrilled though, right?

Alrighty then. Two down, 23 to go!