Our First Gingerbread House

Another holiday first for our family...our first gingerbread house! The box has been sitting in our cupboard since about 2004! Both kids had a great time sticking candy on the house...Sienna decorated the roof with the chimney (left) and Brayden decorated the right side. Hopefully next year Sienna will be more interested in decorating the house instead of eating the candy. Although, there was only one incident that I actually had to fish a piece of hard candy out of her mouth.
Here I am working hard building the house...

Brayden could barely wait for the house to be ready to decorate! I had put the box on the counter several days before we were able to make it, and every day he begged and begged us to make the house!

At last the house was ready! Brayden jumped right in decorating the house...but Sienna was mad that we weren't letting her eat the candy!

Sienna finally decided to do some decorating...

Random Christmas Fun!

Our Elf on The Shelf
We now have our very own Elf on the Shelf! After reading Catrina's blog about their Elf on the Shelf, we just had to get one of our own! Every night the elves head to the North Pole to report to Santa on who's been naughty and who's been nice! In the morning the elves are back, safe and sound and the kids must find their new location! The kids named our elf "Elfie" and each morning they run through the house trying to find him. A few of the places he's been spotted so far, are on the wall...On the art easel...

And on the Christmas Tree!

Dancing Snowmen!
It seems as though we end up buying the fun Hallmark musical decorations every year...for every holiday! This year I managed to make it through Hallmark without buying a new Christmas one. When we got our 2 Christmas ones out of the garage, Sienna pulled the sit 'n spin up to the table and took a seat. When the penguins and snowmen started dancing and singing, she wasn't quite sure what to think...her expression was priceless!

After her initial surprise, she decided they were quite fun to play with. Just like Brayden used to do, she loved to push the button to get them dancing...and then push it again to stop them. Over and over and over and over....

Our New Advent Calendar
I've always wanted the Advent house at Pottery Barn, but I've never been able to bring myself to pay $99 for it. This year I decided I was just going to do it...only to find that it was now $129!!! Well, instead of the cute little house, I found this cute little tree...complete with little ornaments in each little box that you use to decorate the tree. Not only did it come with fun little decorations, but it only cost $49! The kids have so much fun putting the ornaments on the tree every other morning. I've decided to do it every other day so they both get to put one ornament on the tree. Hopefully when they get older they will be able to take turns every day!

Legos
What a cool lego Christmas Tree Brayden made! Well, I'd like to tell you that Brayden made it all by himself, but I'm pretty sure that Chris did most of the work. ;)

Family Fun Night

Last week we headed to one of the local elementary schools for family fun night. The kids got free books, did a few arts and crafts, and saw Santa & Mrs. Claus (Grandma & Grandpa Boley)! What fun! Well, Sienna was just a tad bit scared of Santa & Mrs. Claus...it isn't looking good for our yearly picture with Santa on Sunday.
I guess Brayden isn't old enough to be excited about sitting on Santa's lap. Either that or the fact that he sees Grandpa all of the time, so he didn't see why we were making such a big deal of sitting on his lap. ;)

Mrs. Claus read us a book!

Did I mention that Clifford the Big Red Dog was there? Sienna wouldn't go say hi to Clifford, but her eyes were absolutely glued on him the entire night!

After visiting the book fair, Brayden went on a scavenger hunt (you can see his black binoculars made with construction paper on the table). We saw monkeys, lions, elephants, snakes, etc. How fun! We finished the night coloring books...

O Christmas Tree, O Christmas Tree!

We did it. We got our Christmas tree out of the garage...and out of the BOX! I'm sure those of you who venture out to chop down a real Christmas tree are down right jealous that we don't have to leave the comfort & warmth of our home. ha! Besides, who wouldn't want to build a tree out of a box as one of their family's yearly traditions? To be honest, even though I think it would be wonderful to have a real Christmas tree, there are MANY reasons why we can't/don't have one. The two main reasons are 1) the cats would eat the tree and drink it's water (they even eat fake plants/trees) and 2) I hate to get the inside of our car muddy...never mind that we have all weather floor mats! Ok, there, I admitted that I hate dirt...no making fun of me!

Last year we decided to keep the tree in it's box...in the garage. Sienna was rolling all over the house and I could just see her pulling the tree down on top of her. Plus, we were in Bend for Christmas so we figured it wasn't worth the effort of putting it up. I have been looking forward to putting our tree up all year...and this week we finally did it! Even Brayden was super excited to put up our Christmas tree. What fun that he's finally getting old enough to get into the Christmas spirit!

It doesn't look like much now, but just wait until it's done. We've actually had this tree for at least 6 years. And, it looks the same today as it did the day we bought it...we have definitely gotten our money's worth!

Even Sienna was curious about the "tree in a box"!

Here's the infamous "box"!

After all that hard work, Brayden earned the right to put the topper on the tree!

When it came time to put the tree skirt around the tree, Sienna crawled right under the tree with daddy so she could help, too!

We were so busy this week that we didn't have time to decorate the tree until 2 days after the tree went up (and 2 days of listening to Brayden whine about wanting to put the lights on). Of course, both kids thought it was more fun to decorate themselves with the lights...

Since Brayden has always had a thing for plugging stuff in, he got to plug in each new strand of lights.

Next came the decorations! Both kids tried their hardest to hang the decorations, but in the end, I think Chris and I ended up hanging them all. Sienna kept pulling the tops (hook and all) off the balls and Brayden couldn't seem to get his hooked onto the branches. But, it was still so much fun to decorate the tree for the first time as a family!

When we bought our tree 6 years ago, we bought the only tree ornaments we could find at the time...they were a lovely silver and gold. Since either the cats or the kids manage to break at least one ornament a year, we haven't invested in new, prettier ornaments. Maybe next year I'll get my silver and red tree ornaments that I've been wanting for what seems like forever. Ever since I found out that I was pregnant with Brayden, I've also wanted personalized stockings and tree ornaments. Now that our family is complete, I found the perfect stockings and ornaments to personalize. Here is our new family ornament:

Here's is Brayden's special pirate ornament. Each year I plan to buy the kids a new ornament as one of our new family traditions.

Sienna's pink castle!

Our new stockings! The true colors didn't come across very well in the picture...the red should be more of a dark red. If you look closely, the stockings are not actually on the stocking hooks....they are taped to the mantel (I will be so mad if the tape takes the paint off!!!). I still think these are the perfect stockings, but they sewed the hook onto the stocking the wrong way so they don't hang right. On the bright side, at least I don't have to worry about the kids pulling the stockings down and getting hit in the head with the hooks!

While I was looking for stocking and ornaments, I found this cute family decoration. I chose the year 2007 because that was our first Christmas with all 4 of us.

Random Family Fun!

Officer Brayden
Grandma Boley gave the kids some fun costumes (policeman, fireman & princess) back in June and just a few days ago Brayden asked if he could be the police officer. I have no idea how he even remembered that we had the costumes! He spent all day handcuffing himself to all of us...as well as to other objects small enough to fit into the cuffs!

Pom Poms!
We brought home 2 pom poms from the Civil War party that we went to...not only did the kids have fun playing with them, but the cats played with them too. Well, eat would be a more appropriate description. You don't even want to know that the little strings they ate ended up all over the house in 4 little furball piles. ICK! Anyone want 2 indoor, very affectionate and clingy cats? ;)

The Tape Measure
The other day we had our mini-tape measure out to measure something and Sienna decided she wanted to measure all of her toys...how cute!

Dry Erase Markers
Brayden has always loved drawing in his wipe-clean books. Now that Sienna has to do absolutely everything that Brayden does, she cried and cried until we finally gave in the other night. Luckily these dry erase markers are washable. What I didn't realize is that they wash off of everything except clothes! Sienna had so much fun drawing that she's been crying to draw ever since.

Thanksgiving Fun!
A couple of weeks ago the kids painted their very first turkeys at Gymboree Art class. As you can probably guess, Sienna's is on the left and Brayden's is on the right.

Grandma & Grandpa Boley came over for brunch Thanksgiving morning. After we ate, Sienna wanted to read book after book after book with Grandpa Boley! Grandpa would ask her where something was in the picture and she would point to it.

Of course, Brayden had to join in the fun, too!

Later in the day, we drove to Eugene and met my parents, grandma and aunt & uncle at the Red Lion for Thanksgiving dinner. It was our first Thanksgiving in a restaurant and I wasn't expecting very good food. However, I was pleasantly surprised that the food was pretty good...well, most of it, anyways!!! Of course, it still wasn't like a home cooked turkey dinner, so Chris' parents invited us over for left overs the next night. YUM!

After dinner, Sienna had fun walking around the buffet with Grandma Macnab...everyone working the buffet thought she was so cute!

Grandma planned ahead and brought fun little toys to entertain the kids. Brayden has always been easy to entertain and keep quiet in a restaurant, but the few times we've taken Sienna, she hasn't wanted to sit still for more than 5 seconds. She must be growing up because they both did extremely well and only got out of their chairs right before we were ready to head home.

Sienna loves her new magic wand!

Grandma gave both of them wands and they really enjoyed playing with them...as well as the window blinds at the restaurant!

VIDEO: Singing & Dancing with Sienna!

First off, I'd like to apologize for the fact that Sienna isn't wearing any clothes...just a very large diaper. Before I could get her diaper changed (after her nap), she decided to do a little song and dance! Oh, and please try to ignore Brayden's Scooby Doo on the tv in the background. :)

Despite the tv and the lack of clothes, I just couldn't resist taking a video of Sienna having so much fun. She starts the show off with a little dance, then a little singing and then some more dancing! Oh, and watch for her "falling down" move that she learned from Brayden. Too funny! A little over a minute into the video, Sienna pushes a button that changes the keyboard so it doesn't play songs anymore...just music notes. As you will see, every time she hits a key she starts to do her dance. A split second later she realizes that a song isn't playing and she tries again...and again...and again! She goes on like this until I come over and fix it for her. I thought it was pretty cute. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did!