Before Christmas...

we did a bunch of stuff. Stuff like this:

Freddy the frog from Ade's kindergarten came to stay for a week. He helped us pick out and decorate our Christmas tree.


He also came with us to the Santa Train with the Peiches, where Ade had her face painted like the Grinch!

Mommy did a lot of work (and a lot of extension cord engineering!) to decorate outside and inside the house.

We also met Snowflake the elf! She reports back to the North Pole every night, and then ends up in a new spot each morning until Christmas. She had some good hiding spots, ha!

When Freddy's stay with us was over, Ade got to be student of the week, and this poster hung in her room the whole week at school!

Besides decorating, mommy also got a little manic about baking. The recipe book that came with the Passing Over DVDs with Italian cookie recipes inspired me ;-) Nut rolls, apricot rolls, red velvet cookies, cutout cookies, peanut butter chocolate candies, chocolate mint brownies, and mint kiss pretzels all made the list.

Ade had her first holiday school musical where Ryan, Jenna and I all attended on her last day of school before break.

Then she had her gymnastics open house where she showed us all of her skills!

This past weekend, Ade and I had a grown-up girl day. We went to a fancy lunch downtown and to see the Nutcracker ballet with Briana and Ella.

I had to practice a little nail art before the big day as well. Check out my snowman and Ade's reindeer toes! Jenna is jealous, so next time I will paint her a nativity scene to prove my magical talents.

Next post you get the real deal Christmas details, but we don't want to forget all of the fun leading up to Christmas. December after all is more than 1 day, right?

Funny Ade story to leave you with... Ade has been getting into a bad habit of calling back up at bedtime every night. Personally, I think she likes to just *ensure* we can hear her and respond should she actually really need us, and she needs to test this every night before she can relax, including confirming the alarm is on. One night I asked her what she was worried about. She told me monsters...
Me: "You know monsters aren't real. Have you ever seen a monster?"
Ade: "No."
Me: "Well, why would you believe in something you've never seen?" (I realized this was a tactical error the moment the words were out of mouth, given we are in Santa season... I was right to worry, but for the wrong reason...)
Ade: "I believe in baboons. I have never seen a baboon."
Me: "Solid point."