Christmas Preparations

While Justin was away on a work related trip, we received a special delivery from Mimi filled with fun Christmas activities. The boys enjoyed decorating their snowmen with stickers.

  The package also included some gingerbread ornament kits as well as Christmas paper chains. So, I let the boys do both of those activities and then we added them to our basement Christmas tree. They were so proud of their ornaments.

  We also started a new tradition in the Brown house this year. We wrapped 24 Christmas books and the boys opened on book each night until Christmas Eve. We had the books under our Jesse tree in the hallway between the boys' rooms, but I never managed to get a picture of that tree this season. The boys really loved getting to open a gift each night.

  I have a friend who told me that she made lotion bars for all of her co-workers as a Christmas gift. I was telling Justin the story and he wanted to try to make some for work and for us to share with teachers and such. So, I went out searching for the ingredients (my friend had time to order ingredients online).  I was able to collect the items needed and Justin and I made lotions bars after the boys went to bed one night.


I had a special request from Aunt Shira to made some snowmen handprint ornaments from the boys this year. I had actually seen these on Pinterest too and thought they were cute. Garytt did a great job with the project. It was a lot more of a challenge to get Westyn to get a clear handprint. He kept trying to squeeze too hard, which would smudge the fingerprints. It was definitely an exercise in patience. We did eventually manage to get enough acceptable ones to call it good.


I was happy to be done with the handprint portion of thise project.


We let the paint dry for a long time. Then, Justin added the snowman details with a Sharpie.


Ok, so I was happy with the way the ornaments turned out. Then I decided to add a clear coat to protect those precious handprints. Mommy meltdown.  The clear coat must have had a decent amount of alcohol in the ingredients because it caused the Sharpie to run and turned some of the white paint pinkish. I was so disappointed. We decided that only a few of them were complete losses. We decided to go ahead and give most of them out despite the issues. Live and learn, right?

Christmas Program at LODO

Thursday, December 19 was the Christmas Program at LODO. We were excited for the boys' first Christmas program. Even Grandma and Grandpa drove in just for the evening so they could watch the boys sing.

Garytt joined his class in the classroom prior to the program. The one year olds and two year olds were instructed to sit with their parents in the sanctuary until it was their turn to sing.

Pretty soon it was time for the older kids to come in.
 

Then, a teacher came around to collect the one year olds for their song.


Garytt got a front row view of his brother's singing.


Westyn didn't so much sing but he did sit there without crying and without needing a parent with him, which is more than some of the other kids in his class. And just check out all the parents taking pictures of my their cutie pie.


I took a video of Westyn's class singing "Jingle Bells" but most of them just shook their bells. They are all so cute.


Next, it was time for the two year olds to sing.

Then, it was Garytt's preschool class' turn to sing. They sang both "Silent Night" and "Frosty the Snowman." The class held candles for the Silent Night song, which Garytt was pretty excited about.


Here are some videos of Garytt's class singing.


After the Pre-K class did their songs, it was time for the cookie reception. The kids had all decorated the cookies that week at school and they were ready to try them out.


It was so nice to have Grandma and Grandpa join us for this.


Great job boys..both with singing and decorating the cookies!

Snow Days

Columbia received its first skiff of snow on December 8. The boys were so excited! There wasn't really enough snow to do much with but they enjoyed seeing their footprints.


That little bit of snow didn't really hang around for very long. But on December 14, we received more snow! So, we bundled the boys up and out they went to explore the snow.


This time it was enough that we had to shovel the driveway. As it turns out, the boys were very helpful with this task. We have a couple of travel shovels for our cars that are the perfect size for the boys. They loved helping out!


Westyn didn't last as long as Justin and Garytt did in the cold. So, he came inside with me to warm up while Justin and Garytt finished the driveway. When they got towards the end of the driveway, Garytt started just picking up the snowballs left from the snow plow.
 
  The boys wanted to play out in the snow the next day, too. Check out the big boulders Garytt found.


Westyn stuck with the smaller snow or just walking around with some push toys.


The boys definitely enjoyed the snow while it lasted!