Personal Santa Visit.

Last Sunday, Ella and Holly got a personal visit from Santa! Papa and Nini came over and called Santa, and he stopped by and brought ornaments for the girls.

Papa had to stay on the roof and watch the reindeer while Santa was busy asking the girls what they wanted for Christmas.

It's nice that the girls aren't scared of Santa. I like the pic of Holly in 2009 much better than Ella in 2007. I think Papa, er I mean Santa, does too.

Santa!

We took the girls for Cookies with Santa at the park district today and they both did really well. Ella was a little scared and shy at first, but then I told her he couldn't bring her toys unless she was nice and talked to him...

It seems Ella is losing her fear of Santa and I don't think Holly has one. She chased him around the room!

Ella told Santa she wanted a "chicken" for Christmas. I explained to him that she meant a play kitchen, I think he was relieved he didn't have to bring a real chicken with him in the sleigh.

Holly didn't mind sitting on Santa, thank goodness. It's a little different than when Ella met Santa at this age. She even carried on a conversation with him, he said he understood her, but Jay and I swear she was speaking swahili.

Santa was nice enough to pose with Bunny too.

Snowtime!

We got a lot more snow on Tuesday than on Wednesday (thanks Lake Michigan) and I'm really glad that I took the girls out in it to play when I did. Wednesday we didn't have any snow, and the stuff that fell in the afternoon was that cold and powdery stuff that you can't really play with. Tuesday's stuff was fantastic packing snow. We should have built a fort, but I was tired from pulling them to the post office to mail our Christmas cards.

Holly would fall back onto Ella every time we went down a hill or over a curb.

When we got home, I let Ella pull Holly around for a little while. Sometimes she tried to go too fast and fell down.

Holly lay there like a slug. It was her only defense. Ha ha ha. Actually she doesn't look like she's having fun, but she cried every time I took her out of the sled!

I told Ella she could eat the snow, as long as it was clean and white :o)

She shared a little with Holly.

Then Holly, the girl who won't drink water, chowed down on the snow. Ooof, that's cold.

Holly's November pics

Holly got some help with her pumpkin pie from Uncle Steve. And, she was caught making a big mess!

It's easy to get them to smile for the camera when they're laughing at Snoopy who was right behind me on the TV!

Holly spent part of Thanksgiving at Nini and Papa's house jamming in the basement.

An oldie, but a goodie... Holly holds my favorite Christmas decoration from when I was a kid. Needless to say, it's probably not UL listed, so he was only plugged in for a moment to make sure he still works, then put away. :o(

Ella's November Pics

Ella shows off the centerpiece she made for Grandma's Thanksgiving table. Too bad we had too much food to leave it there while we ate! And of course, a picture of her being a cheeseball.

Ella is really gentle with Nova now. She (Mommy helped) made a toy for him. I wonder how long it took for him to destroy it? Ella was very happy it was Daddy's birthday, she liked the cupcake way better than pumpkin pie.

She loved playing the tea party game during Thanksgiving at Nini and Papa's house. Hopefully she didn't cheat and let everybody take their turns instead of controlling everything :o)

Pint-sized Picasso hard at work.

We had some friends over and after we put Holly to bed, we let Ella stay up and play Rock Band with us. It definitely was amusing. lol

She likes to hold the microphone while people sing.

Auntie Tina taught Ella how to eat olives... see 'em on her fingers? She does that EVERY time now. And she loves her Rudolph and Clarice dolls. She even lets Holly play with them.

Happy Birthday Aunt Sa!

Well, Aunt Lisa's in Mexico, but Ella still wanted to sing to her! Here ya go!

Happy Birthday Uncle Steve (Big Steve)

Here's Ella wishing Big Steve a Happy Birthday!

Ella's haircut

It was time. I'm sick of her hair always looking messy, even 5 minutes after I comb it in the morning and put it up. It hurts me when she cries from the sight of a hairbrush because she thinks it's going to hurt, so she got a big haircut today.

I finally figured, well, her hair grows really fast so if I hate it, it won't be that long before it's long again.

She's so well-behaved for them... it makes for nice and even haircuts. :o)

That pile of hair was a little scary, but look how happy she was picking out her sucker! She also got 2 balloons, one for her and one for Holly.

I love it. She seems to love it too, she's been running around all happy tonight. But, she might just be excited about the balloon and the sucker. :o)