Our Month of Christmas School

Looking back at our weekdays during December, we kept plenty busy with all the usual Christmas preparations, baking, wrapping and a lot of me sneaking away while the girls were happily playing to get a few things done. Not to mention the necessary survival mode of barely keeping enough clean clothes in our drawers and making sure there was some sort of food for us to eat.

In addition to the occasional library trip or play date, we filled our days with "Christmas School" which will definitely be a tradition in years to come. I knew I wouldn't be able to keep up with our normal school routine with all the extra holiday activities so I made our own STEAM advent calendar with a daily science, technology, engineering, art or math activity. This was by far the girls' favorite part of Christmas School and many activities were requested multiple times throughout the month.

peppermint oobleck

building Santa a chimney

We also used Truth in the Tinsel to learn more about the reason for Christmas. Each day we focused on an event leading up to and including the birth of Jesus and created an ornament for our "Advent Ornament Tree". While they certainly didn't retain everything, they learned a lot about why we have Christmas, and I have to admit, I learned some new things too!

And of course in between our school activities there was lots of playing...

imaginary water park

And festive activities.

making sugar cookies

Another Busy December Weekend

This weekend was another busy one. 

We started Saturday with another bounce house birthday which was postponed due to lots of snow.

Which made getting to MiniM.E.'s last ice skating class a bit challenging. But we made it right on time. She had her skills demonstration and since I haven't seen her skate since last year I was so impressed with the progress she's made!

LittleL.G. couldn't keep her eyes open...

We came home to a holiday gathering at our house with our close friends and again, stayed up way too late.

Which almost made us late for MiniM.E. to sing at church on Sunday- it was the first time since I can remember that I had to wake everybody up to be somewhere.

Sledding!

Yesterday we had a great "snow day" and found a fantastic sledding hill near our neighborhood and went sledding with the neighbors. The girls really enjoyed themselves and it was the first time LittleL.G. seemed to enjoy being out in the snow.

Today we were excited to meet our friends at the Spa Park for some more sledding. The weather was nice and mild and the hill was the perfect size for the girls.

Our 3rd Dance Recital

MiniM.E. had her third dance recital last night. For being exhausted from the weekend, she was impressively excited about it. She did a great job. They've come a long way in the past year!

A Crazy Weekend

This weekend was one of our craziest in December! It started out with a Christmas party at the neighbors' on Friday night where we had a great time and stayed out WAY too late.

Then a bounce house birthday party

followed by ice skating for MiniM.E. and nap for LittleL.G. and then as soon as MiniM.E. got home we left for a holiday get together with our friends- again, staying up WAY too late.

Sunday we were lucky to make it up to the indoor waterpark at the Great Escape in time for a waterpark birthday party!

MiniM.E. with Santa and Mrs. Claus

We got home from the waterpark just in time to host a small holiday dinner at our house.

The girls had a blast even though our weekend was so crazy. MiniM.E. even commented that it was "the best weekend of her whole life!" So even though we are all exhausted, it was worth it!

Snow Day!

Our NYC trip really wore everyone out, and we are all a bit under the weather, especially LittleL.G., so we have been laying low.

But this morning when the girls woke up and saw snow on the ground they immediately wanted to go out and play. At 6:30. In their pajamas. Before breakfast.

I managed to hold them off long enough for my coffee to kick in and for us to get a little bit of "Christmas School" done, but even then, we were out playing by 9am!

We took the sled out and I pulled the girls down to a sledding hill we found on the trails by our house, but our German sled with runners didn't do well on lightly covered leaves and we flipped it on the first run and the girls refused another try. Time for a good old plastic sled, I guess... 

We still had a nice sled ride back to the house where we sledded down our front lawn a while and played in the back yard until everyone was cold enough to be convinced it was time to head in. 

Having snow outside put all of us in a better mood today and it was so much more fun reading Christmas books and doing our STEM advent activity. Hoping it sticks around until Christmas!

NYC at Christmastime: A Family Tradition

Every year we debate going to NYC at Christmastime to see the real Santa at the Plaza Hotel, where he stays for the month of December to take a vacation before going back up to the North Pole to deliver all the toys Christmas Eve. It is a big undertaking and a long day of traveling, but even though it seems crazy, we always end up going for it. This year, we went on fairly short notice after checking the weather for the week and seeing a day with temps in the high 50s. Not quite the tropical weather of last year, but definitely worth going YESTERDAY!

Our trip has evolved over the years as MiniM.E. has gotten older and we've gotten to be seasoned pros at scheduling the day and navigating the city.  We drove into Poukeepsie to take the train in where we once again raved about the benefits of the indoor train station and a bathroom break for two little girls that I most definitely did NOT want to use the bathroom on the train.  The girls were fantastic on the car ride this year and happily sat through the train ride with iPads and Pringles.

We started our trip with a walk up 5th Avenue where we always stop for coffee at the Trump Tower. It was a bit more difficult to navigate this year with news crews set up, police blockades, secret service and bag searches, but it's part of our yearly tradition and we had to have our Trump Tower Starbucks.

Next, a visit to the Plaza to check the best time to visit Santa, and then off to Central Park for a hot dog lunch, a nice walk, and a visit to the zoo. While we were walking around the weather was gorgeous, but as we made our way to the zoo the clouds rolled in and it got a bit windy, making us glad I packed hats and gloves!

Then it was back to the Plaza Hotel with promises of ice cream for LittleL.G. if she would just sit on Santa's lap for a quick minute. Thankfully, she complied. We were a bit worried since any talk of Santa seems to elicit terror in her eyes and she has refused to sit on Santa's lap since the day we first mentioned it.

After an ice cream snack we began our walk back down 5th Avenue. Finally, LittleL.G. passed out after not napping all day. She missed the tree at Rockafeller Center and the light show at Sak's, but I made sure to wake her up for the "Bitty Baby Store" (The American Girl Store).

By the time we made it back down to 42nd Street to walk over to Bryant Park it was past dinner time, the time we usually head home on the train. But the Bryant Park Christmas Market is my favorite part of NYC and we needed to grab some food anyway... and the girls would have missed the carousel! So we walked around a bit, rode the carousel, ate some delicious street food, and headed back on the train.

The least successful part of the trip, by far, was the train ride home. Everyone was tired and cranky and it was crowded and we were thirsty because we didn't quite have time to buy drinks at the train station. But we finally made it back to the car where we had water waiting and the girls immediately fell asleep for the ride home.

As usual it was a crazy and exhausting day. But the girls had a blast and we enjoyed ourselves. It wouldn't be Christmastime without a trip to the city!