More 24 Days of Christmas fun!

On Day 11, we painted Christmas pictures...

Beautiful!  And Day 12 the kids opened The 12 Days of Christmas books which we read together. 

Day 13, appropriately Friday the 13th, brought the stomach flu for sweet Tatum.  Not much time for jolly, festive merriment. 

  

And Day 14 was our Progressive Party which we were hosting this year.  Thank goodness the Budd's were happy to host the whole thing and Grandma was ok coming over and watching the kids here at the sick house.  I was sure Ty was going to come down with it at any second.  Here's Susan, Leslie and Veronika, sweetest ladies around.  I think I say this every year but Garrett and I picked the best neighborhood ever!

My sweet man.  It's always nice to get dressed up for a night and feel festive.

The boys.  They're so funny.  Some of them are avid mountain bikers and one hasn't been riding lately due to a very busy schedule at home.  So to show their love for him, Matt made masks for everyone of Brent's face.  Kind of freaky!

Here's Veronika and I, err, I mean Brent and Brent! :)  A super fun night with lots of laughs and even more pictures I care not to post. :)

Day 15 Tatum was feeling a bit better so it was Gingerbread House time!  I had bought this kit at Michaels and didn't realize that it came completely built, you just decorated the outside.  Hey, less work for us!

Everyone pitched in and helped place the candy (as well as eat the candy) and what a beautiful gingerbread house!

 

Just before Tatum got sick, we made Nuts and Bolts for all our neighbors so on Day 16, we delivered our gifts to our friends.  Here's the kids delivering to the Richardson's.  The kids loved this and enjoyed seeing all the neighbors and wishing everyone a merry Christmas!

That day Tatum and I decided to head to Grandma's so her and Grandma could sew a project.  Tatum has really gotten into sewing and loves to use the sewing machine with grandma.  She sewed me two pot holders for my birthday and even hand stitched them closed.  I'm so proud of her!

I didn't get a picture of the finished product but Tatum and Grandma made a Santa hand puppet!  Grandma found it at her Irvine house, must have been something she'd purchased years ago to complete with me.  Just a generation later it was done!

Then the three of us headed to the Bernardo Winery where we enjoyed their festive holiday craft fair.  They do this every year and we love it.  It's so beautiful with all the lights and craft booths, and delicious wine of course. :)  They put this on for 4 nights and we were suppose to go the night Tatum got sick.  But we made it!

Our yearly tradition is to hop on the horse drawn carriage for a ride through the vineyard.  With wine of course. :)

This year they also had a train display with lots of moving and working parts. 

Just that day we'd tried to put together my dads train set that we use to put around the Christmas tree when I was younger.  Those real train sets are so intricate and delicate.  I think we'll have to wait till the kids are a bit older to appreciate it.  But Tatum loved seeing this display.

 

And then of course she loved seeing Santa and Mrs. Claus!

Mrs. Claus let me get in for a picture too!

Tatum wasn't quite ready to get back to school on Monday so Day 17 we made Christmas cookies.  These are my great Aunt's molasses cookies, delicious! 

I took this picture to text my mom because my grandma and I use to make these cookies together every summer when we'd go out to Colorado to visit her.  She always wanted to put the cookies so close together on the pan and I'd always say we needed to put them farther apart so they wouldn't cook together and make square cookies.  I pulled this batch out and it was obvious that my grandma would be proud.  I must be maturing. :)

Day 18 brought another episode of the stomach flu.  Poor guy, he felt horrible.  And the activity for that day was Ty performing in his Christmas program.  We were all so sad that he couldn't make it, especially since this is his last year at North City Preschool.  He did sing a few lines of Away in the Manger for me later that evening. :)  I think we watched a Christmas movie this night to be festive.

Day 19 Ty still wasn't up for anything major so we just read some beloved Christmas books.  But Day 19 he was up and at 'em so we headed to the Santa house behind the Bernardo Winery.  We've heard about this place but never made it over to see.  We started off waiting in line to see Santa and Mrs. Claus.  While Garrett held our place in line, we went over to write letters to Santa!

Grandma helped Ty by writing out what he dictated, and here it is...  How sweet that he threw in there a request for a coffee maker for me, and a last ditch effort with the "I was good". :)  Love him.

Tatum was very reluctant to write her letter but after some coaching, she got it done and they both put it in the mail box behind her.  For every letter written to Santa, Macy's donates $1 to the Make A Wish Foundation.

They offered free hot chocolate and cookies, yum!

Garrett was so nice to hold our place in line but about this time the kids decided they didn't want to see Santa again and just wanted to check out the cool house. 

Love the posing. :)  Ty saw Tatum stick her knee out and he had to too.

We walked through the house and they had beautiful displays like this one for our American troops.

Tatum loved this princess room with Cinderella and her coach!

I loved the Grinch!

And they had a whole village set up out in their backyard, amazing!  We couldn't believe the hours of work that must go into this to set everything up.  And where do they store all this?!

The kids had a wonderful time and the best part was each child got a free toy!  This is all put on by one generous couple that loves the Christmas season and giving back to their community.  What a blessing!

Day 20 was the last day of school for Tatum which meant a fun field trip to The Nutcracker and a holiday party in class!  Tatum was in Pamela's group and as you can tell, the girls LOVE getting a ride on the bus and can't wait to see the show!

 

Here is Kale'a, Sophie, Tatum and Destiny enjoying their sack lunches! 

 Back in the classroom, there were fun activities set up such as snowman decorating, Bingo,...  

frame making and pictures of course,...

And a book exchange!  Each child picked a book and got to take it home and either open it that day or wait till Christmas.

 

Look at these cuties!  Sophie and Tatum were in class together last year too and their sweet friends!

The best part of the party was that Mrs. Kirchmeier came!  I missed catching a picture of her new baby Maddy but Tatum was so excited to see Mrs. Kirchmeier and give her a hug.  All the kids are looking forward to her return in February.