Christmas Goodies and Good Times

Lucky Mavys! Ben never left again once he came home for the weekend! I don't know how I could possibly have had everything ready in time without him. It would have been pretty sad if he was gone at such a fun time of year.

Here are the girls in front of our decorated Christmas tree. We got it at Rite Aide. It certainly looks nothing like the healthy, bushy tree on the package, but it's just the right size for our little place. Last year a friend gave us an enormous artificial tree that took up 25% of the living room. It was gorgeous, but we'd have to make one of the kids sleep outside if we did that again this year.

Ofcourse, the girls had a blast decorating the tree with "instruments" as they call them, and they were very excited to help me make a star out of a toliet paper roll, a Life box and tin foil. The nativity scenes are also a big hit, the girls love to play "Baby Jesus" with the ones Grandma Mavy gave them a couple years ago.

The next day, the girls put on their animal jackets, and headed next door to make goodies with Grandma Mavy. Here they are, baa-ing and roaring on Grandma's patio.

They dipped pretzels in chocolate and sprinkles while Libby worked on her own pretzel.

Then on Monday, we went to Nonna and Poppa's house (my parents), and made all kinds of Christmas goodies with my sisters, Angie, Jackie, Bernadette and Stephy and Stephy's kids, Johnnie, Sarah, Mae and Jimmy. As you can see, a good time was had by all.

That's frosting on their hands and faces, by the way.

Another favorite activity of the season is "bell-dooring" as Eve and Sadie call it. Here they are after dropping goodies at a neighbor's house, ringing the bell and running away before they got caught. Eve and Sadie tried to do it on their own this particular night, but they ran back to the car with the goodies still in hand and it's unclear if they rang the doorbell. We almost got caught making a second run.

Thank goodness Ben was home to participate. Door bell ditching just wouldn't be the same without Daddy.