Advent 2016

We have been celebrating Advent by lighting our candles and reading the Christmas story each night at dinner.  Ruby and Ada have enjoyed adding a character to the nativity scene on their advent calendar each morning and having their chocolate advent calendar each evening too.  As always, we've thrown in a bunch of other December activities; making lists, christmas programs, class parties,  open houses, parent-teacher conferences, giving and grading finals, meetings, basketball games, St Nicolas' visit, cutting a Christmas tree, decorating, making gingerbread houses, baking Christmas cookies, shopping, ballet classes, and more!


Ruby and Ada have both made wish lists.

Got it?!  Oh, and Ada also made this at school.

Hmmmm... maybe she'll settle for a toy kitty?!

We got to go to an exciting basketball game!  Baylor was playing the highly ranked Xavier and we decided to check it out, being told that staff could get free tickets.  However, when we walked up to the ticket office there were at least 200 students in line and I thought for sure we were out of luck.  Thankfully I was wrong and we walked right in and got to see a great BU win!  We are excited to go to some more games this winter.

Since we were out of town over Thanksgiving we had to wait until the first weekend in December to go cut our tree.  It was chilly, wet, and muddy, but we found a great tree!

It's a little Charlie Brownish, but that's the way we like 'em.  Once decorated  and lit up, it's always magical!

The girls put out their shoes and St Nick delivered again; Christmas PJ's for everyone!

I'll spare you the pics of Steve and I, but we've all been wearing our jams every night!

Ruby's GT class had an open house one morning so I got to go in and see all of the cool things she's been up to and had lunch with my gifted girl!  I also had a parent-teacher conference with her GT teacher who said she's creative, respectful, and an enthusiastic learner.  So proud of her!

My calendar winds down as the semester finishes in early December which means I get to do things like go on preschool field trips to the zoo!

We also missed the annual Advent event at our church when we were in Omaha and the girls kept begging to make a gingerbread house.  We found a kit with 4 mini houses and made them last weekend.  Three out of four of us promptly ate our creations.  I'll leave it at that!

Did you see it??!!??  Yes!  We finally got our new table!  Merry Christmas to me!  You might remember, we sold our dining table when we moved to Waco and have been using a craigslisted Ikea table for the last two years.  After coveting the Harp Design Co tables, we ordered one this summer.  It took 6 months, but it was well worth the wait.  We love it and think it fits perfectly in our kitchen.  I'm hoping for lots of friends, family, and memories around that table!

After reading the book together, I took my big girl to see The Best Christmas Pageant Ever play.  It was so good and Ruby loved it.  I remember going to many plays at UWRF growing up, and I hope Ruby and Ada can enjoy the theatre too.  As you can see, someone was not thrilled about the fact that Ruby and I went to the play. 

LOL!  To be fair, Ada had a date with Mom a few days earlier and went to a play as well.  We saw a children's theater production of A Charlie Brown Christmas and one of our friends was even in the angel choir!

Ada got to be an angel herself in her preschool Christmas program!  So sweet!

Ada Christmas Program from Steven Nelson on Vimeo.

And, yes, we decided to add another activity to our evenings starting in December!  We finally signed both girls back up for dance.  They are both doing ballet and tap so we spend two hours at the dance studio on Thursdays.  It seems a little nutty, but they love it!  Ada has a huge class and loves every minute of it.  They had pajama day this week! 

If you look in the mirror you can see Ada, she's the one in the light pink pajamas.

Ada Christmas Ballet 2016 from Steven Nelson on Vimeo.

 I have been incredibly impressed with how much Ruby's class has progressed from the last time she took lessons.  She's only had three classes so far and already learned a whole ballet and tap routine.  I LOVE their ballet dance!  (This video is long but I'm the Momma and I love watching them dance!)
Ruby Christmas Ballet 2016 from Steven Nelson on Vimeo.

Looking forward to lots more fun and wishing you Hope, Peace, Joy, and Love this Advent season!