Sometimes

Sometimes I flip through the pictures on my phone and I find little surprises. Unexpected gems that I didn't take myself and I had no idea that they were there.

Like these:

It's the little things

It is the little things that make it Christmas to me. We recently acquired a Swedish angel chime. Growing up, we had one and would light it during the Christmas season. This night we were eating spaghetti. All the kids refused sauce and ate just noodles. I tried out a new recipe for cooked carrots and the kids were not having it.

But, the angel chimes were in motion, we were eating off our Christmas dishes and using the Christmas napkins. It was perfect.

Teenaged mutant ninja gingerbread boy

William brought this gingerbread boy home this last week from school.

St Charles Christmas Festival

For years, I have been hearing about the St Charles Christmas festival. Yet, we've never been. We are always so busy getting ready for Christmas and then traveling, we have never made time to go. For the first time this year, we figured out a way to make it work. At the last minute, of course, but still it happened.

The historic area downtown 15 minutes away (if you have ever been to visit us, we have taken you here) puts together a celebration with characters, music and other special events.

We loved it. The kids were unsure at first, but warned up quickly when they realized the charters were handing out trading cards.

Surprisingly, William was the one to warm up first and willingly approach the different characters. I was so impressed with him. Some characters demanded performances in order to receive one of their specialty cards, and William went along with it.

He bowed to the Snow Queen, he let Jack Frost make fun of him, he impersonated a bell ringing for the town crier, made a silly face for Suzie Snowflake without hesitation.

Amelia played along too, after she had some time to watch William at it. She too, bowed to the Snow Queen, recited nursery rhymes with Mother Goose, and told the Sugar Plum Fairy her favorite treat.

We enjoyed the fife and drum parade and then some cookies.

What a special day and great memories. This is something we will have to add to our holiday circuit for next year. I mean, we didn't even get to see the parade, meet all 35 characters, or pet the reindeer!

Santa

We went to a really fun event in an adjacent town 15 minutes away this weekend that was a lot of fun. One of the features was a number of Christmas themed characters, including many Santas.

The first Santa we met was wonderful. He was jolly and had the longest, curliest beard I have ever seen. I was dazzled. I found myself smiling with Christmas cheer.

I looked down at Gemma in my arms to see if she was as charmed as I was.

Nope. Her eyes were narrowed and her lips were pursed. She studied Santa skeptically. She didn't say a word until we were walking away, then she blurted out:

"Hey! Where your reindeer Santa??!?!"


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Plan?

We were all in the car yesterday. There were so many things we needed to get done before Christmas. There were errands that needed to be completed and tasks to be done. We loaded everyone in the car in the hope of checking many things off our list.

I hopped in the front seat and John and I took a minute to confer about what to do first. As we discussed, a little voice popped up from the back seat:

Gemma: what's the plan guys??? Going to Grandma's house?

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Conversations

I am so sad that I can't remember every single hilarious conversation we've had.

Mama: bad news kids! There weren't any vegetables in the fridge for us to take to grandma's house!

Kids: huh? How is this bad news?

Mama: I guess this means you will have to eat double vegetables at dinner time at grandma's house.

Kids: what?

Mama: at grandma's, you will need to eat vegetables because you didn't have any at lunch.

Amelia: what if grandma doesn't have any vegetables?

Mama: well, then grandma will be in big trouble!

Amelia: you mean, grandma will have to go to jail? Do they only eat vegetables in jail?

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