Christmas Take 3?

I think this counts as our third part of Christmas. Today Nanny and Grampy gave by with more gifts. Nanny had to work on Christmas so we had to have a make up day the next night.

Now for the aftermath...

Can you tell I spent the whole day cleaning?

Christmas with the Almeida Family

We were spoiled again this year. It began on Christmas Eve. Every year my in-laws host a Christmas Eve party at their home. Emma and Ethan received many wonderful gifts that Emma was very excited for. Unfortunately I didn't take any pictures because I left my camera in the car, sorry!

When we got home I began cleaning for Santa. Santa will not leave presents at a messy house because if your home is messy you are not taking care of your things. I looked over at our nativity set and I noticed a few strange things. Can you find anything wrong with this picture?

There are actually two things wrong. The first is that their is a Fisher Price baby Jesus in this set. That one, surprisingly enough, is not the baby that came with our set. I still had our Jesus "up in Heaven" because I do not put him in until Christmas. Well, for the second year in a row that was making Emma crazy so she supplied us with her own baby Jesus.

The second thing that doesn't belong is the cowboy behind Joseph. I guess he is just guarding everyone. That is very kind of him.

Emma was so excited to leave snacks for Santa and his reindeer. She was so excited to go to bed on Christmas Eve. It was really fun how she "gets it" this year.
We had an Elf On a Shelf this year (Click here to learn more). If you have any toddlers I highly recommend this for next year. Emma really enjoyed searching for him each morning. You are not supposed to touch the elf, our elf is named China, because they loose their magic if you handle them too much. We made an exception on Christmas Eve since he would be heading back to the North Pole on Santa's sleigh. We will miss China a lot!

Santa Came!
He left two sacks of goodies and a huge train table with all the train stuff you could ever need.

Ethan woke up first

Then Emma and Daddy

"Just what I wanted a Belle dress!"

The Christmas Chaos at our house

The best gift of 2008

The family picture with a reluctant 3 year old

Then we were off to my Grandparents for round 2

The Retelle Side

My dad finding out what Santa has in his sack.

Princess Aurora peeking out from the forest (aka Christmas tree)

Lauren's Fancy new Ristmas Socks. They are all the rage

Now for this boy...

He happens to be my almost 18 year old brother. He gave us quite a scare on Christmas. Apparently he hit a patch of black ice on the way home and ended up flipping his car onto its roof. Thankfully he is fine, his car is not so lucky. I am just so thankful that he is fine. Love you Bob, take it slow please. <3

8 months!

Can you believe it?

Cookies and Cupcakes and a Mess, Oh my!

Since it's that time of year, Emma and I have been busy baking. It's nice that now that she is three she likes to "help" me more. She is great at adding ingredients and mixing. It's great that she is so eager to help all the time. It is also funny to see yourself in someone else. I notice her coping a lot of what I do when she is playing. At least I know she's paying attention.

The first thimg we needed to make were some sugar cookies for Santa. All of my teacher friends should appreciate my Feinstien sweatshirt. It's not very flattering but I love that thing.

Emma was the taste tester. You can't feed Santa poison cookies!

Our finished products

A few days later we made some yummy chocolate cupcakes and had a little cupcake party. It started off innocently enough but soon it turned into a terrible mess.

Showing off our hard work

Yum!

Ethan didn't want to be left out.

You might remember that when Ethan turned 6 months we let him have a little cupcake. He really wasn't into it at the time. Now that Ethan is just about 8 months though, he is very into them. You can really tell in this progression of what turned into a terrible mess.

Emma FINALLY mastered the "big girl cup!"

Getting worse

Oh, no!

Who gets cupcake in their ear?

Directly into the sink

All Clean!

We are so excited for Ethan's first Christmas and Emma's 4th. This is such a magical time of year.

Ugly Christmas Sweater Party

Jill Richard hosted an Ugly Christmas Sweater party this weekend. There is nothing like giggling with girlfriends all night to cheer you up.Unfortunatly I didn't get one picutre of myself in my borrowed sweater. Once I get the pics from my friends I will update them over here.

Jill Morse didn't hold back at all. She went head to toe with her outfit. My favorite part was the headband with the bow, never mind the makeup.

Sarah and Amanda

Lizzy all poinsettia'ed out

Julie and Gina

The Calderone Christmas Card

Amanda, Cate and Emily
Love the Kitties Em!

Our Hostess Jill

Peppermint Patty Shots...well I think that is what they were called.

I was really scared to do one of those put it was actually really yummy. I would have had more if I didn't have a long snowy drive home.

We also played a really fun game of Charades. I apparently had my A game on that night and got my team a lot of points. Each team had to make up their own clues for the other team to act out. You can tell that we have been friends for a long time because our lists ended up being really similar. We even had some of the same words!