Time before Christmas

As usual, things were very busy the weeks leading up to Christmas.  I didn't take very many pictures between Thanksgiving and Christmas.  It always seems like I am taking pictures of things, but when I go back sometimes there aren't any, so maybe I am just too old now (see pic below) and can't remember things.  They had a Christmas party at the club where they had a Santa.  I didn't want to brave the mall to see the Santa there, so we got lucky.  Claire was quite thrilled to be able to tell Santa what she wanted for Christmas.  Among her wants were an itouch (with a pink case), Lego friend Lego sets, an American Girl horse, a pink recorder, and black "high heel" shoes.  Well, Santa did pretty good at 4 out of 5.

Andrew didn't really want to sit on Santa's lap, but we told him to be a good example for Grant.  On his list were several PS3 games, more recorder songs, Sharks tickets, 49er tickets and the movie Despicable Me 2. Santa managed to get everything except the 49er tickets. 

The first thing to notice about this picture is that Grant is wearing shorts and a t-shirt.  It is really hard to get him to wear pants and long sleeved shirts and sometimes I don't have the energy to make him change.  Grant wanted a steam train, a fire truck and the Planes movie. 

The long awaited arrival of the Idaho cousins happened on December 22nd.  They were so excited to see them again even though it had only been a month since we had seen them at Thanksgiving.  After church we made gingerbread houses together.  I totally thought that I had taken more pictures, but most likely I was covered in icing.  They had a great time designing their houses and putting on as much icing and candy as possible.

The next day Natalie watched the kids for me while I went to SF for work in the morning.  Because the weather has been so nice they went outside and rode bikes and played for a while.  As usually, these two were inseparable.  It is always interesting to me that when they see each other again, they hug and are so happy to see each other but continue on like they haven't been apart.

Yes, it is true, on December 23rd I turned 40.  I don't feel that old, but apparently I am.  My mom had a big dinner with party hats of course.

Hats for everyone!

On Christmas Eve, Uncle Pete finally managed to get Claire's forever loose tooth pulled.  He is the expert at this.

My mom has a tradition of making cinnamon rolls for Christmas morning on Christmas Eve.  Natalie and her family were with Pete's family for Christmas Eve so Claire got to help all by herself.  My mom let her do all of the steps on one batch.  First she rolled out the dough.

Then she brushed the melted butter on the dough.

Next, spreading the brown sugar.

Yikes, cutting the roll.  It was more of a smashing until we taught her how to gently saw back and forth.

Arrange them in the pans.

Then let them rise for a while before cooking.

Claire's teacher gave her a bag of reindeer food which her and Andrew spread on the font lawn before going to bed.  They also made sure to put out cookies and carrots for Santa and his reindeer.