Christmas Pictures

Hairy Dawg checks out the loot.

Look at that tail... too cute!

Don't worry mom... I can open your presents, too!

The chef shares her feast.

Shelby was completely overwhelmed by Christmas! She came downstairs, saw her much asked for play kitchen and went straight to work in a businesslike manner "cooking" up some pretend treats. She played with that thing all day and even made us move it down to the den so she could continue to play with it while we opened stockings. We usually open presents in the living room in front of the tree but we ended up just carrying them all downstairs to open because we couldn't pry her away for a second! Scott's family came over for brunch and then it was on to more presents. Shelby loved everything - everyone was really too generous! Thank you! She crashed for a late nap and then woke up for more playing. We got out of the house that evening for a little Christmas light viewing before calling it a night. We had a great day. You can see more pictures in our Christmas gallery.

Christmas Morning Video

Here's a short video from our Christmas morning. Shelby is pretty quiet in it... I think she is just completely overwhelmed! She's been playing with her kitchen non-stop!

Christmas Eve

On our way to church for Christmas Eve service. 

Cookies for Santa. 

I want to sleep under the tree! 

Play kitchen assembly begins. It would probably take less time to renovate an actual kitchen.

A tea set, kitchen treats, play food and "Georgia jammas" - as requested!

Meow! O'Malley must make an appearance. Our peaceful living room awaits the morning chaos!

Christmas Treats

Here's a short video of Shelby supervising some holiday treat making. We are making white chocolate Chex mix. It's one of my most popular holiday treats and so easy to make. The recipe is below:

1 box of corn Chex
1 bag of small pretzels
1 bag of holiday M&Ms
1 container of salted peanuts
1 package of white chocolate bark coating

Combine the first four ingredients in a large mixing bowl (you might have to divide it into two batches.) Melt the bark coating in a bowl in the microwave according to the package directions. Pour over the mix and stir gently to combine and coat all pieces. Spread out on wax paper to dry and then break apart and store in an airtight container or treat bags.

Christmas Vacation

Today kicked off 12 days off for Christmas vacation! We had a fun day bumming around, running errands and having dinner with friends. She was acting pretty cute and funny today. This morning she wanted to put on her ballet clothes and dance around. We put on The Nutcracker for a soundtrack and Scott grabbed the camera and made this video of her doing "tippy toe dance" and then pretending like she was going to bed. (Pardon the disaster area that is our guest room ... is where we wrap presents and shove anything that we need out of sight at the moment.) She kept saying "Don't wake me up! I'm going night night!" over and over again, if you cant understand what she is saying in the video.

She also said some other funny stuff today. She pulled two bows out of the wrapping box, stuck them on her shirt and said "these are my boobs." Um. OK. Where does she get this stuff? We were also driving around looking at Christmas lights after dinner tonight and we drove by a house with a ton of lights and she said "That house is crazy!" It's hilarious and surprising when she says new things or uses words in ways that we didn't know she could. What a funny girl.

Christmas Cheer

This is how our kitchen/dining room window currently looks. I love it so much. We hang a garland up every year and add our Christmas cards to it as they come in the mail and it makes me so happy to see so many cute babies, clever friends and growing children that I might just leave it up all year. I save all of the photo cards we get every year in a shoebox and I love going back and looking at them and seeing how families have grown every year. No real point to this post, other than to say my heart is filled with holiday joy! 

Shelby's Christmas Recital

Thursday was Shelby's preschool Christmas recital. Her class sang two songs and they did a great job! In this video, Shelby is on the right side of the stage wearing a red dress and black boots.

Santa Success

We capped off our Christmassy weekend with a Sunday visit to the mall Santa. Shelby was brave this time and went up there to get her picture made and she even talked to him for a minute - success! More pictures of our Santa visit are in our gallery.

Christmas Tree Quest

Shelby liked the goats and really liked pointing out "there's the goat poop!" 

Here's where I tell you about our 150-mile, three county round trip search for a cut-your-own Christmas tree farm. Here's a tip: always CALL the tree farm before you drive all the way out there! We set out for one in Lawrenceville on Saturday morning and when we got there, they told us all of their mature trees had already been cut (really?! by the second week of December?!) and they didn't have any more to sell. We'd driven 30 miles out there, so we made the most of our wasted trip  by feeding their livestock and going on a hayride. Fun, but a bummer we didn't make it home with a tree.  

Another picture from the treeless tree farm.

After Shelby's nap, we set out for tree farm #2 in Stockbridge. It began to drizzle on the way there, we got lost and by the time we pulled into the parking lot, it was pouring rain! And it was starting to get dark! I was in full on Grinch mode! Boo! Our Christmassy plans were getting more ruined by the minute. After about 10 minutes, the rain let up enough to go chop a tree, so we set out across a muddy field in search of our perfect tree. We found one and Shelby had a great time running around in the field and watching Daddy cut down the tree. She said "Oh no! It fell down!" 

Shelby supervises the sawing. 

Shelby is obsessed with every picture taking opportunity that arises. 

Decorating the tree. 

We got home Saturday night, set up the tree to dry off in the garage and went to bed exhausted. The weather improved on Sunday and we got to bring our tree inside and trim it. You can see more pictures from our weekend adventures in our photo gallery.

Friends

Sora and Sasha came over for a Bambinell's pasta dinner on Wednesday night. These two always have so much fun together! 

Tucker Tree Lighting

We had a great time tonight at the Main Street Tucker Tree Lighting and Christmas Celebration. We met with two neighbor families for dinner and drinks beforehand and then took in the festivities on closed-off Main Street afterwards. There was Santa, a huge tree, s'mores, cider, snow bubbles, ornament decorating, cupcakes... it was a fairly temperate and not too cold winter wonderland! Shelby had a great time playing with her friends and devouring a giant cupcake. I love making the most of Christmas and hitting up as many holiday activities as we can. If she stays up a little past her bedtime and consumes too much sugar, it's all worth it to see her happy face!

You can see more pictures in our Christmas photo gallery.

Our Weekend in Pictures

Thursday night, we had a pizza dinner with Sora and Sasha and then enjoyed some festive Christmas light viewing. We spent most of our time at this crazy house on Oak Grove Road. The house was covered in animated lights, all set to music. It was insane!

Shelby all bundled up in her new butterfly jacket. She looks like she's about to hit the slopes! 

Scott and I spent Saturday at the Georgia Dome for the SEC Championship game. It was a beautiful day and a perfect tailgate. We had a great time. Until.... 

Pre-game excitement before an incredibly memorable game. Unfortunately, Georgia suffered a heartbreaking loss, but it was still one of the most thrilling games I've ever witnessed and we won't soon forget it. I'm so proud of our team and how hard they fought and I'm sad for them that they didn't make it to the national championship. 

Meanwhile, Shelby spent the day with Mimi and Bobby. Here she is at a church Christmas festival sporting her Georgia "G" that she got at the face painting booth. She's such a little fan and we couldn't even tell her where we were going because we knew she would be to come with us!

On Sunday, we spent some time enjoying the outdoors to clear our heads after that gut-wrenching loss. It was so warm and pleasant this weekend. 

We capped off the weekend with a pizza dinner with the neighbors. Six adults, seven kids and good times! Are you sensing a theme here? Kids + pizza = happy parents! 

Fall Fun

Nothing is more fun than an impromptu afternoon playdate with the neighbors. Sorry neighbor trying to rake your yard... seven children had important leaf pile diving to do! Afternoons like these are what makes me thankful and happy to live where we live and I wouldn't trade it for anything. 

We warmed up with some delicious potato soup after our leafy fun. You can get the recipe here. 

Pink Pig and Santa

This morning, we made a trip to Lenox Mall to visit Santa and ride the Pink Pig - an Atlanta tradition. It feels slightly ridiculous to be doing all these Christmas activities and it's not even December yet, but when it might take multiple attempts to get your child to warm up to Santa Claus, we take all the opportunities we can! Here's a couple of pictures from my phone - you can see more in the gallery. The Pink Pig ride was a success, but Santa not so much. Luckily, there was no line for Santa so we got to take our time and walk right up to him twice, but Shelby wouldn't get close enough to sit on his lap or take a picture. It's an improvement over the crying from last year, though! She's very interested in Santa, just from a distance. 

All smiles for the Pink Pig! 

All dressed up and in the Christmas spirit!

Checking out Santa from afar. It took a while to build up enough courage to even stand in line. 

All tired out after an exciting morning. 

Here's more information about the Pink Pig. Safety be damned, I wish we could still ride in a miniature pig monorail on the rooftop of the downtown Rich's! 

Football Fun

We had a great time in Athens today! Shelby was such a good girl and had such a fun time at the game.   She will certainly miss football, Hairy Dawg and Uga now that the regular season is over! It was a noon game and Shelby fell asleep in my arms for about thirty minutes during the second quarter. I was surprised she could sleep in the middle of all the commotion but I guess all the excitement just wore her out. It was so sweet and cute - she hasn't slept in my arms like that since she was a baby and I could have held her bundled up like that for the rest of the game... even though I couldn't see a thing when everyone around me stood up! 

Enjoying a donut at the tailgate. 

All bundled up!

Go Dawgs! 

Thanksgiving

We've had a wonderfully relaxing Thanksgiving week so far! We had dinner yesterday at Papa and Glee's house and took advantage of the beautiful day today to visit the zoo. On the way there, we asked Shelby what animals she wanted to see and she said "the kitty meers" - her translation of meerkats! Ha! We got a good laugh out of that. Tomorrow we're headed to Athens to see Georgia play Georgia Tech in our last regular season home game. Here's a couple of pictures from our weekend so far. More are in the gallery.

Shelby helps out mama in the kitchen.

My apple pie from scratch. Yum!

The Hartmans on Thanksgiving. I just noticed Sadie peeking out - haha!

Feeding lettuce to a giraffe at Zoo Atlanta! Fun!

No trip to the zoo is complete without a train ride and a carousel ride.

Thanksgiving Feast

Shelby the pilgrim. 

Tonight was the annual Thanksgiving feast at Shelby's preschool. It's loud, crazy and adorable. Each class decorates placemats and table decorations and they wear funny things like homemade pilgrim hats or Indian headbands. A high school jazz ensemble plays during dinner and during the end of the meal, a group of energetic toddlers (including Shelby) had a dance party at the front of the stage. It was so cute! 

Ice Cream Treat

After school ice cream treat at Oak Grove Market. We also picked up a dinner to go there and it was great! And check out that long ponytail!

Our Weekend

Thursday night, we had a dinner date at Fellini's with Sora and Sasha. They are so cute together and whenever we tell Shelby we're seeing Sasha, she can't stop talking about it. We went out to look at the patio fountain after dinner and I gave them some pennies to throw in. They thought it was the BEST. THING. EVER. Children are so easy to amuse sometimes! 

On Saturday, we went to Stone Mountain to ride the train. I can't believe their Christmas attractions are already open, which means the train ride is part of this overpriced ticket package full of things that Shelby isn't even old enough to enjoy. How disappointing! We just want to ride the train! We rode the gondolas to the top of the mountain instead and that almost made up for missing out on a train ride. We were there right around sunset and the views were breathtaking. 

On Sunday I went running on some wooded trails in a park near our house. It felt like I was up in the mountains and I am continually amazed that such such a beautiful pocket of nature exists in the city. This huge rock waterfall is amazing and all the fall leaves just made it that much better! 

Shelby enjoying a family heirloom rocking chair. 

Enjoying the planes and playground at PDK.