In regards to Santa Claus, I am curious how Tory will react to sitting on his lap this year. She shoots me a puzzled expression every time I mention him in conversation, so more Santa education may be needed before we pay him a visit anyway. Last year, Tory's near meltdown forced me into the obligatory Santa photo and that's not something I'm interested in repeating. Maybe sitting on Santa's lap with Aden this year will be enough to convince her to get the shot? We shall see ....
Anyway, in place of a Santa visit, Tory and I made holiday crafts. I'm loving the flexibility of our advent calendar activities this year because it allows us to do things when we're in the right mood for them. Just as I pulled out all the craft supplies, Baby Brother started to fuss so I busted out the Moby Wrap for the first time. At two-weeks old, Aden's sleepy newborn-ness is wearing off and now when he's tired, he fusses for me to bounce him to sleep. What happened to falling asleep by yourself in the swing, little guy? As soon as I snuggled him up in the Moby, he was fast asleep and Tory and I continued on with our crafting.
First, we made a construction paper reindeer hat. I measured a piece of brown construction paper around Tory's head, traced her hands using the same sheet of paper and taped it all together using Popsicle sticks to hold the hand cut-outs in position. Then, we glued googly eyes and a red pom-pom nose onto the front. Easy peasy.
Then, Tory decided Mommy should wear the reindeer hat instead.
We were having so much fun, why stop there? I decided to hot-glue Popsicle sticks together to make snowflake shapes. I gave Tory some washable finger paint and let her decorate the sticks. After the paint dried, I hot-glued fishing line to the back of each one and hung them in our kitchen window. Honestly, the snowflakes are a little on the ugly side. A few sequins or glitter would have dressed them up nicely, but I didn't have any on hand.
This was one of those really good parenting days. You know the ones that come out of nowhere and make you smile with wonder because your kid is just so cool to be around? It was a perfect snow day with my little girl, making crafts, listening to Christmas music and spending time together.
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By the way, Tory has been doing an awesome job of sleeping in her big-girl bed lately. When Aden was born, Andi's started putting Tory to bed and now she hardly has any wake-ups anymore (maybe one or two a night and usually falls right back to sleep). Because she's been such a good girl, our Elf on the Shelf friend, Elfie, brought Tory a special present on this day -- elf tutu's. Tory was so excited about Elfie's new skirts, she put on her own "beautiful dress" over her pajamas and twirled around the living room with Elfie. It's was super cute. As I suspected, Tory still doesn't seem to grasp the concept of Elf on the Shelf (doing right vs. wrong and Elfie reporting back to Santa), but she's enjoying finding Elfie every morning.
The holidays are just a million times more fun with little kids. I love it.
We usually visit Santa a couple times during the season, and let the kids just talk to him with no stress of having to sit on his lap and smile. It seems to have helped over the years and the boys love just popping in to tell him about a toy that they've had their eye on and get a candy cane, even Henry who is very shy and suspicious of new people. Then we can usually get a lap picture once during that time.
ReplyDeleteOh when the newborn sleepiness wears off. Eventually he'll be smiling though and it'd the best!
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