Christmas 2012

One of these years I'm going to take a picture of Christmas Eve. Christmas day is a lot of fun with the presents and going to visit friends and family and stuff, but Christmas Eve in our house is really what needs to be remembered in these blog books. But because it's one of those sacred things, it's not something I think of taking pictures of. Next year though, next year...

In the meantime, we will share our Christmas day pictures! 

Our present-opening actually started back in November. Mike's parents send all the grandchildren an ornament every year for Christmas so that when they leave home they will have a whole bunch for their own trees. 

Here's Finnegan opening his very first Christmas ornament!

 You can see Madie is very excited with hers--even if you can't see what it is. It's a simple plaque with a cute lobster on it holding a sign that says, "Maine." It's cute--and indestructible--and those are two good things. Finn's is a little rocking horse. Madie's first is also a rocking horse, so when she saw his she screamed in excitement, "HE HAS A ROCKIN' HORSE JUST LIKE ME!!!" 

Then we celebrated Thanksgiving, then Mike's birthday, then Alexa came (no pictures, sorry, her fault, not mine), then we got a turkey from Mike's work so we had Thanksgiving le Deuxieme, then we had the Christmas program at church, then Christmas Eve basketball on Monday, then we had Christmas Eve night and voila! Here we are Christmas morning!

 It's really cute--maybe everyone did this other than my family--on Christmas Eve "Santa" wrote a letter back to Miss Madeleine so she could read it on Christmas morning. Mike says he got a letter from Santa in his stocking every Christmas morning as a kid. (This was one of many instances that helped to convince Alexa and I of our deprived childhoods.)

Reading Santa's letter. He even drew her a picture!

Santa answered Madie's letter to a T. I don't know if you can see it in the next two pictures but she got pretty much an entire box of candy canes!

Holding her candy canes.

Santa also gave Madie some awesome Barbie BandAids so she can play phlebotomist even more! Oh yay.

 Finn got a neon green pillow pet! We're not entirely sure what animal it is, but it doesn't matter all that much since even if we all knew, Finn would not. 

He is so excited he's drooling. 

Madie opens a pair of sparkly pink Mary Janes. Ooooo! Aaaaa!

 Another Watkins tradition is matchy pajamas, to be opened the night before Christmas--sorry Karen. DIdn't happen. I actually didn't know we had them until the night before Christmas when Mike put them under the tree and said that's what they were. Oh well.

Finn models the front...

and the back.

This year's jams are pretty cute, but I have one BIG complaint:

Where's my trapdoor?

Merry Christmas! We'll see you in 2013!

Jackson's Holiday Party

Okay, this first picture was snapped on my phone (actually, all these were, I guess, my phone or Mike's) because it is so funny. Madie's preschool had these cute little snowmen out in the hallway where the top circle was filled in with the face of the child. All of the faces were either cute smiles or blank stares, except for one of the teachers, who made a silly face that Madie had noticed on our way into the classroom (this was before she had her picture out there). When I went to pick her up, I stood there looking and looking for Madie's picture. Where was it? Where could it be? There aren't that many on the board, so why can't I....Oh...

|

 |

  |

   |

    |

     |

      |

I see. I just couldn't recognize my daughter's face. This whole thing is so Madie to me. All the rest of them also had big puffy white cotton balls all over them. I can just picture how this whole thing went down:

Teacher: "Madie, don't you want to take a fun picture for your snowman?" 

Madie: Looks away.

Teacher: "Here, smile!"

Madie: Turns with THE FACE.

~~~~~Later~~~~~

Teacher: "Okay! Let's decorate!"

Madie: "I wanna do the glue."

Teacher: "Okay, go for it! And look, we've got buttons, and cotton and, this is just so cool!"

Madie: Loads on the glue, sticks on a ball. "I'm done."

On Thursday we went to Mike's work for a family Christmas party. It was so fun! Well, there was kind of a lame comic magician, but the music was fun, and Santa came, and there was ice cream and cookies and presents and Christmas mice drawings on the wall--so fun!

Watching the magician...kind of pathetic.

Madie really wanted to sit on Santa's lap, which surprised me. She's so shy about things like this, but I had showed her a picture of a friend's daughter (that's you, Kristen!) at the mall with Santa and she was sure she wanted to do the same thing. But then when her name was called and I took her up she just stared at him and made no move to get on his lap or hug him or anything.

Santa?! He was really friendly.

He did say, "Would you like to sit on my lap?" and she nodded. It was so cute.

Mrs. Clause was handing out the presents. Madie was so happy afterward and just kept talking about her present from Santa!

What's this?!

A Dora doll?! YESSS! 

And she came with a soft fleecy blanket! Oh, and dream come true!

There was also a great clown doing face painting. Madie really wanted to do that--as did every other kid in the place. We stood in line forever and were one of the last, but that was okay. I actually didn't mind waiting, we got to chat with some of the other mother-kid duos there while Mike cared for Finnegan. Then they came and joined us and Mike took picture while Madie sat so still as she painted these pretty flowers on her wrist.

The 24 Hour Boston Adventure

Last weekend we went down to Boston so that Mal could become Zumba certified at an all day course. We decided to make a weekend of it (somewhat). We stayed in Lowell, MA on Friday night at the Courtyard Marriot. You can see Madie about to pound me with a pillow because I was pretending to sleep on her cool pullout bed. She had a lot of fun! It was a bummer that the pool was closed. Who puts in an outdoor pool in a Massachusetts hotel??? Only seasonal =( Very thankful that we all got a good night sleep though.

The next morning we found the "Classical American Diner", prefabricated with steel exterior, almost a railcar look, and Boston accents flying left and right. When we walked in, I felt like we had walked onto a movie set.

Check out these juke boxes...each booth had their own. They didn't work, but I'm sure they did at one time.

After a good greasy breakfast, we dropped off Mal and headed for the train.

Madie was so excited to be on the train, I think she was more excited to be on the train than go to the aquarium to see the fishes.

This is their relationship as of right now. Madie sticking her finger in his ear.

When we first arrived in downtown, we went to the iMax theater to watch a movie. It was a 3d movie, and the opening scene was one of a huge wave breaking right onto us...with the 3d effect...was a little bit too much for Madie (now wearing 3d glasses) and Finn (who just happened to glance over when the wave was crashing). Madie flinched, trying to cover her face with her hands. Finn just screamed! We lasted about 10 more minutes, and then Madie was a little too scared. So we just headed right into the aquarium. These little penguins were fun to watch.

Madie refused to take a picture standing next to Finn with that seal in the background. She just hates pictures!

Finn was in a great mood, all day.

Checking out the seals.

This guy was so close to the window, Madie loved watching him.

Based on our trips to PetCo and the amount of time Madie spent watching the fish in the aquariums, I thought the aquarium would be an all day event! We probably spent only an hour in there....now, how do I kill 6 more hours with two kids in downtown Boston?

We ended walking up to the North End to check out Little Italy. The lunch was pretty good, not as impressive as I thought it would be. I guess when you have a really good friend who has created some of the best Italian dishes in the world...it's hard to compare. It was fun to see all of the little shops though. And people kept giving things to Madie! She got the rose at the restaurant, and the lollipop at an Italian pharmacy. They just couldn't help themselves.

After walking around a bit more and hanging out in the train station, we finally got back on the train.

Madie watched Cinderella so that I could deal with a hungry Finn-man.

After 10 minutes of movie time, she just couldn't keep her eyes open. This was a long but fun day.

Stats

The Finn man officially turns 6 months tomorrow! He had a check-up last Wednesday with his new doctor, who, by the way, I really like (thanks, Dad, for the recommendation). He's a bit of a light-weight, but don't be fooled: his brain should be big enough to outsmart Sherlock Holmes, not to mention some jock bully. 

Height: 39th percentile

Weight: 13th percentile (he's just a little guy)

Head Circumference: 98th percentile

Let's hear it: "Heeed! Pants! Now!" Mike is so excited. I can only hope his hair comes in red.

He also had some shots, the poor little tyke. Here he is after I nursed him, making himself feel better with a blanket and his fingers.

Awwwwwww

And here he is with Dad on our walk last night. He was so happy!

Hello Santa!

We saw a fun, white-and-red-striped mailbox in the post office down town, so we came home and wrote a letter Saint Nicholas. I meant to snap a shot of the mailbox when we went to mail it, but I forgot both the camera and my phone! But here's the sweet little work.

I drew that sad little purple candy cane for Miss Fi per her request. The blue one is about 2/3 Madie and 1/3 me--she's just starting to make recognizable shapes--and the green one in the middle is all her. 

And her adorable letter! I love this! Just in case you can't read it, it says, "Hello, Santa! It's Christmas! Please fill my stocking. I want candy canes from you in my stockings. (So does Mumma.) They're really nummy. And please give my friend Lottie green candy canes. One, two, three candy canes! Have a merry Christmas!" 

I'll be honest, I prompted her--hello! She's 3. She doesn't know how to write a letter. She hardly grasps the full concept of it. But I tried really hard not to put words in her mouth. I would just say things like, "How should we start it? We could say, Dear Santa, or Hello Santa," and she said, "Hello Santa!" It was so cute. And sounds just like her.

She said the sun was in her eyes. 

And then she played with Dad's swim goggles, while wearing her snow suit, and these are the awesome shots I got.

Joys

So I'm skipping a bit here and there on this Christmas photo thing. Partly because I'm just not going to get around to posting every single day, and partly because some of them I think are a little dumb. For example: "Favorite Christmas Movie." (That was Dec. 2.) I can tell you that: probably The Muppet Christmas Carol, but there are others that tend to fight for my attention, depending on the year. I don't know though, maybe I'm just not artistic enough to think up some adorable way to photograph that. (Actually, I know I'm not. But that's really okay with me.)

These photos are for the 3rd and 4th--"Red" and "Joy." Here they are in one sweet little package:

It's so fun to see the kids getting to the point where they can really play together. Madie is slowly (sloooowly) learning that some things that seem painless to her are torturous to Finn, and Finn is responding more and more to Madie's antics as he gets older. My red afghan was a gift from my Grammy Haskins from about 15 years ago or so. I love it. In fact, I'm wrapped in it now!

One little tid bit of information that has nothing to do with the photo prompt: that sweater Finnegan has on? Mike's. ****Awwwwww!**** It says it's a 12-month. Yeah...not gonna be happenin' in June, I'll tell ya.

Monday was so nice I called Mike to ask him on a lunch date with the kids and me. We picked him up from work and drove a mile or two down the road and hopped on the trail next to it. We only had about a half hour before Mike had to be back at the lab, so we kept it short, but it was nice to see him and good to get out.

My View Today

My friend Aimee posted this on Pinterest and I just saw it and figured, why not? 

December 1st: Your view today.

I'll be honest, this first one is kind of cheating. It's not exactly a "view" like you're thinking, but it is one of the first things I saw this morning, so I'll count it. And it's a great symbol of what today is: Mike's birthday! He told me a few days ago he was having a hard time deciding between pistachio cheesecake (which was supposed to fix the indecision problem!) and the fruit pizza I made this summer.

"But, I think we'll just make fruit pizza my Father's Day tradition." 

Hey, at least he makes it easy.

But then last night he said, "Ya know, I just keep thinking about that fruit pizza, and I think I want it for breakfast." Good thing I bought that extra package of cream cheese yesterday, just in case.