We need a little Christmas!

I didn't take many pics because I was too busy enjoying myself, but here's our Christmas this year:

I want barbies and ponies.

Lights at the Washington DC temple. Very beautiful.

Christmas Eve - matching jammies

Belle, Amanda, Kari, and Evee

Will, Belle, and Steve

 Tommy

Kari

We had a really nice Christmas this year. It was hard not being with the whole family, but my sister's kids came home from college and we had a really great time. We spent Christmas Eve at our house with the tradition of potato soup. Christmas Eve is really my favorite part ever since I was young. Then Will read the nativity story from the Bible with everyone acting it out for Belle's sake. I filmed it, but would hate to incriminate anyone by posting it. :) Belle was Mary, Steve was Joseph, Evee was baby Jesus, Tommy the donkey and Herod (or Harold as Will kep reading it - ha ha ha), Amanda the angel/wise man, Brenna and Kari sheperds/wise men. What good sports. It was fun. Then we opened jammies and watched A Christmas Carol. We dragged mattresses upstairs and had a big sleepover up in Belle's playroom. Good times. Lucky for me I'm the ony one who could sleep through Will's snoring. Then we did Santa at our house before we spent the day at Kari's where we opened the rest of the gifts and watched A Christmas Story. "You'll shoot your eye out!" Classic. We had a nice ham dinner by candlelight. It ended up being a really nice holiday.

Belle Moments

Splashing in puddles and spinning in the rain in December. How crazy is that? Will, Belle, and I were pretty soaked today. So we came home and made fudge and hot cocoa for dinner. Hmmm....I wonder why we all had upset tummies tonight? But it was sure worth it. I love December. It is the month of, as my former boss would say, the fudge diet. You cut out regular meals for fudge. You don't want to chalk up too many calories, so if you're going to sacrifice it's definitely not going to be the fudge! :)

Yesterday we were reminiscising funny things that Belle has said. Here are a couple that made me smile:
Tommy needed to use the bathroom, but Belle was in there washing her hands, so she told Tommy to "hold your bagina". Hmm...
Belle is the "stupid" police. It is probably the highest level of a swear word to her. If she overhears anyone saying stupid she makes them apologize to Jesus and Heavenly Father. So she started to say stupid one day when she was upset and stopped herself with a shocked look on her face. She was so worried and exclaimed, "I said stu! Tell Heavenly Father and Jesus I said stu!"
When we went to see Santa the other day there was a spot where you could write him a letter. They had a spot where you fill in the blank "I've been _______ all year." I asked Belle which one - good or bad. She looked nervous and whispered, "Bad." So I started to put the pen on the paper and she says, "No, tell him I've been good, I don't want him to know!" Since then we have really been really trying to enforce that she is good, just sometimes makes choices that aren't so good.
And then one last one. I was telling her this silly thing my dad used to say when I was a kid. Afterward there was a long pause from her. I said, "Isn't that funny?" She says, "No, Mom, that's not funny. That's just weird."

I love my silly girl. She makes me laugh. My life would certainly be dull without my Beanie in it!



Not so Lucky Charms

Belle is a special child in many ways. One of her great talents is making my blood boil. I sure love that girl, but when she gets in one of her moods, oh boy! She is a very strong willed child. Let me repeat that: a VERY strong willed child! She has days that are especially bad and will frequently end up in a rage attack. Yesterday was just one of those such days. When Will came home I was pretty much just a skeleton of myself. He told me to go out today. Will had homework to do, and Evie is a pretty easy baby, so I brought her a long and we did some Christmas shopping. Not the most intelligent thing to do to relax (for future reference). Well, in my head I imagined to myself coming home to a nice cleaned house, baking cookies with Belle, and enjoying the rest of our day. Wrong-o! Lucky Charms everywhere, and I do mean everywhere. Belle is nowhere to be seen and Will is sleeping blissfully on the couch. What the crap! The entire living room floor has Lucky Charms all over it (minus the marshmellows, of course). Then I glance in our bedroom. Even more Lucky Charms on the floor. And there sits the guilty culprit. "I was doing like they do on Monsters, Inc.!" she says. Really? I could have sworn it was a small trail to lead to the next room, not an entire BOX to carpet the floor. I told Belle, "But the little girl eats them up so there are none left." Belle, noting the expression on my face and in fear of getting in trouble, quickly starts shoveling them in her mouth. A mom can never really get a break anyway, right? :)