My Little Bear Trapper

Christmas Crafts with Daddy

Jason surprised us and brought home some little craft bags for the kids that SAS put together.  They were really, really cute, and Miles and Vivienne really enjoyed spending the time with Daddy and doing some crafts. 

The gingerbread man (or woman?) door hangers were a big, big hit!  I'm so thankful for a thoughtful husband who spends time like this with our little ones.  The kids were so proud of their work.

Sisters

New Christmas Traditions

We started a few new Christmas traditions this year, because the kids are old enough to understand some of them.  I think my favorite was this advent activity calendar that I made at a girls' night with my friends, Pam and Kristi.  There is one envelope for each day, and the kids enjoyed taking turns (ok, well, sometimes they didn't exactly enjoy the "taking turns" part) opening the envelopes to see what our activity for the day would be.  It could be anything from "go to the park" to "lunch with Grandma" to "go see Christmas lights" or "wrap a gift."  I'm already looking forward to doing this again next year.

Other traditions that we began this year include the Elf on the Shelf and a wooden Christmas tree advent calendar.  Each day, the kids would take turns opening an ornament to put on the little tree.

Only 350 days until next Christmas... 

Swaddle Weaning

A couple of days ago, I decided that I would try weaning Evelyn off the swaddle.  I guess it wasn't so much of "weaning" as it was just cold turkey.  I stopped swaddling her for her nap one day, and she did fine.  Then that night, she still slept fine without the swaddle.  So I guess you could say we had another relatively uneventful swaddle weaning process.  Miles and Vivienne were both also easy to stop swaddling.  I guess we just lucked out!

Christmas at Grandma and Grandad's House

After Grandma and Grandad got home from Florida, we had our second Christmas at their house. The kids loved opening their gifts and spending time with their grandparents. The big gift for Miles was a train table. It involved a lot of assembly, so we took it home with us and assembled it after the kids went to bed. Then we brought it out the next day while Grandma and Grandad came over to visit. Miles and Vivienne love it. They play with it almost every day.

Catching Clouds

The day after Christmas, we took the kids to the Life and Science Museum in Durham.  Even though it takes us a little while to get there (about 30 minutes), it is well worth the drive.  The kids love it, and we love it, too.  It is a great way for the kids to blow off steam (inside or out, depending on the weather), and I love watching them interact with the animals or blocks or physics experiments or model trains.  There is always something new and different, and the kids love it.

Building something with large foam blocks

My handsome blue-eyed boy

Miles loves the track with the balls.

Evie is always along for the ride in the Ergo.

Daddy helps the kids try to catch the "clouds" in the atmospheric exhibit.