Christmastime is here...

I felt like Christmas was an entire month-long celebration in this house! It was my favorite one so far because of Nico's age and level of excitement about it all. There was a Christmas movie playing every night in this house, Christmas songs regularly sung, talk of why we celebrate Christmas, and threats talk of Santa and his nice/naughty list. Kittybo the elf came to visit again this year too. We went to many events that all added to the magic of this time of year. I can honestly say that this may be more fun being a toddler's mom at Christmastime than being the child.

We decorated the house AND the front yard this year. Points for us. This consisted of multiple trips to Home Depot, Walmart, and At Home (and never getting out under $40-50!)

Nico was a good helper.




Not bad for our first attempt Will have to add on every year! (Just nod yes, David.)




We picked Nico's 2 favorite characters. He was pumped every night when the sun started going down, since he knew that meant he could inflate these guys.




He loved putting ornaments on the tree. He likes to have jobs and takes them seriously. We let him have free reign on the bottom third with the cheap bulbs, and our nice ornaments were put up top. He sang Santa Claus is Coming to Town, to himself, while putting these ones up.

Here is the finished product and my favorite part of the Christmas decor. It's always so fun (I'll speak for myself, not David) to reminisce on all of the different ornaments since they all have special meaning. I'm turning into my mom.

Only the best wrapping paper for this guy. Santa and mommy/daddy may have gone overboard this year.



There were a lot of kid-centered, Christmasy events around Austin that I made sure we did this year! In Bee Cave, they had a snow day, and Elsa from the Frozen movie came to visit. We were there about 2 1/2 hours, and it was a fight to tell Nico we had to eventually leave. At one point, we were there so long, that we had to walk over to Dick's to get him some gloves since his hands were getting so cold. He got a kick out of making little snowmen the whole time. We came with his buddy, Greyson.

 

Later that day, after naptime, we went to the Dripping Springs Christmas festival to walk around. We ran into Santa, and Nico gave him a high five and knuckles. He told him that he wanted cars, trucks, and boats for Christmas. Greyson and Nico ran around all over Mercer Street, and we stopped in a cute little shop for some frozen yogurt.

(While we had our Christmas festival day, David was partying it up with his BFFs, Todd and Scott, at the new Baylor stadium! Partially jealous...)

On one of the weekdays, my mom took Nico to the library for a storytime of the Polar Express, and he was able to color and play with trains. When the reader started off the story, she asked if anyone knew who lived in the North Pole. Nico was the first to answer (go figure) and proudly announced, SAAAANTA.