Family Christmas Portrait

Genevieve, Mommy and Daddy had their portrait taken for the holidays. Genevieve turned it around and enabled the family to have its first professional portrait. Afterwards she was rewarded with a dinner at Skyline - love that spaghetti and cheese!

Santa's Milk and Cookies at Happen Inc.

Another fun evening at Happen Inc. Tonight, we made plates for Santa's cookies. Genevieve took great care to use EVERY color of glaze available. Mommy could not stop adding details. Daddy showed the greatest restraint with a simple design and ony three colors (his was really a group effort - Gigi lent her hand and Mommy traced it).

Gigi talked Tommy's ear off (see the picture below, he only has one ear) as usual.

Mommy Wins A Gingerbread Display! & Fetching the Fir

Mommy bid on a gingerbread display (that had no other bids - what do you think it looked like?) and won it with the only bid (pros: cheap. cons: see pic). She sent Gigi and daddy to pick it up today. When we arrived in the hall, Genevieve ran over to her favorite from the day before ( the purple trimmed castle with a rainbow on top - see the picture from December 7th). Boy was she disappointed when I said that was not the one we were taking home - the crying and drama all the way back to the car.

After we picked mommy up from work, we picked out our favorite Christmas tree, a frasier fir, which turned out to be the last one. A little Charlie Brownish mommy thought, but fresh smelling and tall (kind of like daddy!)

Pink Yogurt and Gingerbread

It was a BFF mother and daughter gathering for breakfast out and a trip to the Shriner's Gingerbread display. The day started with breakfast at one of Genevieve's favorite spots - the pink yogurt restaurant (a.k.a First Watch) with Leela and Ava - and their mommies, of course. She had her usual fresh fruit crepe.

After breakfast all went to the Shriner's temple to see the annual Gingerbread display. The houses were impressive! All sorts of tasty building materials to form sugar wonderlands including some familar spots - the museum center, and elephant house at the Cincinnati Zoo. Gigi's favorite was a purple trimmed castle with a rainbow on top. No great surprise there!

Uber-day on the Holiday Calendar

December 6th was "THE" day on this year's holiday calendar --Mommy's and Daddy's favorite holiday events all on the same day (and Genevieve's too, because we said so). From the start, it was not the day we planned. There was a festive blanket of snow, making it all lovely, but not the best for driving. Our first activity of the day, community breakfast with Santa at Immanuel Presbyterian that we had done the last 2 Decembers (Mommy's pick) was a no-go because of behavior/loss of privilege.

Holiday Faire at Gigi's school was next on the agenda (Daddy's pick). The special bonus this year was Grandma & Grandpa were attending as well. Sadly, not long into the event, Mommy and Gigi morphed into their alter-egos, Brat Girl and Rage Mommy. Daddy was not there to save them. Mommy knew the situation was dire when a stranger stopped in the room in which the two were melting-down and asked if she might be able to help -- perhaps take the girl away for awhile? This transpired in the "childcare" room Mommy was manning for Daddy while he took Grandma & Grandpa on their tour of Gigi's room, Willow Tree Nursery with Miss Carmy.
Ooooops. Not so good for business. Guess Daddy's booth was not going to win any fundraising prize. Lots of fun was had with the Pocket Fairy, the gingerbread decorations, and the craft room Secret Santa. Next year we will be sure not to miss the Treasure Gnome - a boat floating back with a surprise.

We departed Holiday Faire with Grandma and Grandpa and began the trek to Aunt Kristen's house. The children happily played for hours, then we bundled them up for the evenings festivities - Mommy's favorite event, the Lebanon Holiday Horse-drawn carrige parade.

This "smalltown" parade has all the components of an idyllic Christmas event -- an old Main Street with plenty of shops, booths lining the street with favorite aromas of hot chocolate, roasted almonds, fish tacos, deep fried sugar coated griddle cakes; carolling along the streets, live winter characters greeting the children, dinner at the old Golden Lamb Inn ( grandma and grandpa tested the fare) and topping it off -- THE PARADE. This year there were over 115 horse drawn sleighs and sleds decked out in everything from Rudolph to miniature horses to the 3 wise men and even The Grinch! What made it extra special this year was the snow falling during the parade. It all went by too fast but the spirit was certainly felt.

Do the Downtown Dazzle

Today, Genevieve, Rye Russell, Denham and Andrea met downtown for some special Christmas celebration (mommy was at work) . First we met Santa at Macy's for a picture, then we went to the Netherland Plaza to see the downtown Gingerbread scene. Finally, we traversed parts of the old Skywalk and ended up at Duke Energy's amazing train display on 4th Street. One of the trains was completely made of ivory! Genevieve spoke to one of the train engineers about something completely unrelated -- he was pleasantly amused.

Happy Birthday Uncle Daniel

Today was the day for the Cincinnati cousins Christmas pictures at a studio in West Chester. After donning their holiday garb, it was our turn. Alex wanted nothing to do with the event but our photographer did a great job getting him to finally smile (we did find one out of the 70 taken). All of the grandparents received a framed portrait of their little darlings.