Merry Christmas!

A very merry Christmas was had by all this year. It was really exciting to see Noah start to figure it all out this year. He was a bit overwhelmed by the presents on Christmas morning and ended up being completely mesmerized by a puzzle that sang "The Wheels on the Bus" (forget the oversized firetruck and Diego doll!). And after some relentless torture by Jon and my family about going overboard with the presents, I finally convinced them that the presents were really for me, because I'm the one that gets to entertain him all day and I'm getting pretty sick of his old toys!



On Christmas Eve we spent some time with my family reading the Christmas story and singing some Christmas carols. It was a lovely time together. My mom got out some kid-friendly nativity pieces and Noah was able to sit and play with some of the pieces while we read the story. I think he really enjoyed it. Jon and I have a little game we like to play after FHE every week with Noah. It's a spin on an old family game called "Hucklebuckle Bean Stalk". Basically we "hide" (usually in a pretty obvious spot) one of his toys while he's in the other room counting and then he has to come and find it. He LOVES it -- so we decided to play it after our Christmas story reading and have it be a bit more applicable to the evening. So, instead of playing "find the car"... we played "find baby Jesus". Definitely appropriate, don't you think? He loved it and was totally wired the whole time -- he especially loved showing off for gma and gpa as you can see.



We want to wish all of you a very Merry Christmas and a wonderful New Year. We are so grateful for our many blessings, especially the gift of our Savior. And just as Noah so simply displayed -- best wishes in your quest to "find baby Jesus".

Santaland!

So, we braved the crowds of tourists today (something Jon and I generally despise) and headed down to Macy's on 34th Street to introduce Noah to Jolly Old St. Nick himself. I heard reports that it was totally worth the wait in line and that we wouldn't be disappointed, but of course I was still skeptical. However, I am happy to report that it was indeed a very magical Christmas experience even for me and even on a busy Saturday in NYC!

We seemed to arrive just before the major crowds started trickling in and I think I figured out the best route from the subway station to the elevators in Macy's so as not to get totally frustrated even before we arrived (maneuvering a sroller on those busy midtown streets can be SUPER annoying!). When we got in line, we weren't quite "in" Santaland and I started to get nervous about how Noah was going to survive the wait, but then as soon as we saw glimpses of giant trains, ice skating polar bears, skiing penguins, marching band bears, and giant alpahbet blocks (a recent obsession), I knew he would be fine.

As we were standing in line, I kept wondering how the line was moving so quickly -- I thought there was no way that people were on and off of Santa's lap so quickly, but I wasn't about to complain. It all became more clear, however, when "our" excited and very over-enthusiastic elf came and quickly ushered us to "our" Santa! Dude -- there were like 20 different Santas! HAHA! I couldn't believe it -- the whole process was such a well-oiled machine. The elfs would come and get you and try to distract the little kids from seeing any of the other Santas. I knew something was up because I had never seen so many "happy" employees of a NYC retail institution! I'm definitely not complaining though -- it was so easy to get into the Christmas spirit when everyone was so friendly and happy. And Santa? He was AWESOME! I loved him. I think I was playing out some unfulfilled Christmas experience from my childhood, because I was so taken with him. You could tell he must have been an actor, because he was just that good. He was so sweet with Noah and really let him warm up to him. He gave Noah "five" and Noah was automatically his best friend! We were really worried about how he would react to Santa due to his "stranger danger" angst of late... arg!... but he loved him.

Anyway, it was really fun and I encourage all you NYC mommies out there to make the trek -- it was totally worth it.

Oh, Christmas Tree...

This weekend seemed to be the perfect weekend to get our tree and start decorating for Christmas. Unfortunately Jon was on-call on Saturday, but he was able to sneak away to come and help us get the tree. Luckily our favorite Christmas-tree-selling-Canadians were back this year and we didn't have to go far to get the tree (gotta love NYC and its sidewalk-Christmas tree vendors). So, we picked out our tree -- it's a little Charlie Brown-ish, but it's got a lot of character :)

I was worried that Noah have a hard time controlling himself and just tear all the ornaments off the tree, but he's actually done pretty well. He loved putting the candy canes and tinsel on the tree, so now he thinks that's his job and will take them on and off... it's cool, though -- it keeps him entertained for a minute!

We had our first snow in the city yesterday... hooray! I love the first snow here. It makes the city actually look clean. I was happy to get out early for church and enjoy it before it got dirty! And it was so nice to have the apartment decorated and enjoy the christmas lights and snow...

add a little hot chocolate and some Mo' Tab' Christmas carols, and that's pretty much the best Sunday afternoon ever.