Snowflake Tea

 We had scheduled to go to a Christmas Tea at a local tea shop with our friends Bekah & Mel (Jodi being previously engaged with a trip to Hawaii!!) but the weather closed the tea shop down.  So we decided to have our own little tea party (minus Mel since she lives up in the hills and heading out wasn't going to happen!).  Heidi helped me prepare the 'tea' while Allison & Mark went into Corvallis for errands and to pick up Bekah.  It was a very simple tea party; sandwiches in Christmas themed shapes, homemade maple pecan scones and Trader Joe's Christmas Sugar Cookies.  I had them eat some oranges and grapes, too.  Oh, and special 'warm chocolate' of course!  Heidi was fascinated by all of the excitement in the kitchen!

 

The two girls ready for tea.  I don't really have any more pictures of it, but we had a great time (although we definitely missed Mel & Jodi!).  And yes, Allison was wearing a swimsuit.  She was giving her dolls a swim lesson and she ended up wearing it all day.  While it was all of 19 degrees outside.

 After playing outside in the snow the girls got another round of 'warm chocolate' but this time just the Swiss Miss standard mix.  And the rest of the cookies from the tea party.  While I was putting whipped cream & sprinkles on the hot chocolate Mark looked at me and asked 'Does Nate know how much sugar you are feeding his daughter?'  I figured I'd make up for it with a healthy dinner! :)

Oh yes, and what would a tea party / play date be without a craft?  This was a foam nativity set and it was way. too. complicated.  Thankfully the girls' patience ran out before mine (just barely) and it was abandoned with out me pushing for it at all.  But it did entertain us for the better part of an hour.  Lest anyone thing I'm a crafty super-Mom - it all went in the garbage and I felt no guilt!

December SnOw Day No. 2!!

 Our next day of snow was fabulous; sunny & chilly so the snow didn't melt!  Mark started the day by clearing the driveway.  When I went outside he was sweeping it with a shop broom and I couldn't figure out why.  When he pulled out our plain old flat shovel I realized we don't have a snow shovel!  Ha!  I'd never seen someone sweeping snow before.

 Anyhow, Allison, of course had to be outside the whole time.  She loved digging in the snow and finding our landscaping rocks.

 Later in the day Bekah came over and so the girls got to play outside.  Allison & Bekah were out there on their own for awhile and Heidi sat at the back door and watched them, a bit on the jealous side!

 Eventually the Heidi got to go out and 'enjoy' the snow.  She doesn't seem to embrace it yet, but we're working on her!

 The girls took Mark for a ride.  For about 10 feet.  We were still pretty impressed with how strong they were (or Bekah was!)

 And then the Heidi-bug got a sledding ride from Bekah.

 Oh yes, and Heidi's venture ended with a face plant off the sled.  She didn't actually act all that distressed about it.  Which is a good thing considering her mother laughed and took a picture of her!

And I had to get a picture of Heidi with her rosy-red cheeks after playing outside.  I love that look!

Cold Weather Baby

 We have had cold weather and Heidi has not had good afternoon naps.  The end result has been an overly tired baby in the evenings.  Sooo, we've been taking her on walks and checking out the Christmas lights.  We bundle her up and it isn't uncommon for her to fall asleep in the Beco carrier.  Gotta love it while it lasts.....won't be much longer and she'll be too big!

December SnOw Day!! (Number 1)

 We've had some very cold weather lately - and finally had some precipitation to go with it and the end result was waking up to several inches of snow!  It was Heidi's first snow day.  She was excited!  Although she wasn't really sure what was going on but how could she not be excited to get to stay home in her PJs all morning!?!

 Soo....the snow was still coming down when we took our first adventure out.  It was very dry snow so it wasn't much for sledding and snowmen but we still had fun.  Well, most of us had fun, I'm not so sure Heidi enjoyed the snow blowing into her face.

 Our bundled Heidi-bug

 Trying out sledding for the first time!

 Making snow angels!

The girls & I just about ready to head in!

This sight made my day, a Christmas tree with snow outside!

Curtis Family Tree 2013

 We picked up and decorated our Christmas tree this weekend.  The girls loved doing it!  They both wore hand-me-down Christmas dresses to church today, too (Heidi's was Allison's when she was a baby and Allison's was Bekah's from a few years ago, I love these dresses!)

 Our new bookshelves are perfect for Christmas decorating.  We put all of the nativity sets & books Heidi can play with on the bottom shelves and Allison's stuff on the middle shelves and my favorite (and delicate) decorations on the top!

 The girls got their (matching) Christmas PJs & ornaments tonight.  Their ornaments came from Etsy this year, I love them.

 Allison with her collection of ornaments - one from each year and her Baby's First Christmas ornament.

 Heidi's 2013 Ornament

Allison's 2013 Ornament

Our Weekend

I am really enjoying the camera on my new phone - I can download the pictures from the weekend and see all sorts of things I would have forgotten otherwise!  We had a great weekend at home, just hanging out as a family (Mark has been recovering from a cold so things were definitely low key!).

 This is the Heidi-bug's remote.  It is one for our old (broken) t.v. so it is all hers.  She is pretty proud of herself when she gets a hold of it!

 When I climbed into the Honda to go get our tree this is what the mileage was.  I had to take a picture!

 We went to our favorite (and rather fancy) tree farm to find a tree this year.  We opted out of taking the wagon ride to the field to pick & cut our own tree.  We wandered through the pre-cut ones - Mark figured they were okay since they were cut around 9 am that day (he is a rather picky Oregonian about his trees!).  It isn't the most impressive of our trees but we like it.

 (I had Heidi in the Beco carrier - I'm thankful she still likes that thing, it makes it much easier to carrier ehr around!)

 Sunday luch was rather unusual.  The girls had to be in the middle of the action (decorating).  And Mark was in the middle of repairing my Grammy's German Nativity Pyramid....I don't know how long since it has been functional....likely well over a decade!

 Allison opened her first '25 Days of Christmas' present from Auntie Brittney.  We had Britt on FaceTime for the opening.  Let's just say Allison is excited about her stash of presents!!

 And our family outing was to WalMart.  We hardly ever go and for some reason it sounded like a good idea, we needed dishwashing detergent after all!  Anyhow - we didn't get much but we found this cabin made of Coca-Cola.  Seriously.  I really wanted to by a pack of Coke but I couldn't find any that weren't part of the cabin!

 We had breakfast for dinner (omelettes & pumpkin muffins).  Allison gave me a hand wearing my apron that my Aunt Pam made for me.  It isn't really a Christmas apron but it looked sort-of Christmas-y.

 And we had our first Advent dinner.  December has completely caught me off guard me this year so I felt as though I was barely ready.

In the middle of all of our decorating and arranging this weekend Heidi has not only figured out how to climb the stairs but developed a desire to do so.  We'll have to keep a closer eye on her now.  Because just having a tree full of ornaments wasn't challenging enough.  :)