Baby it's cold outside!

 
 
 
 
Last week, we had our first fire in the fire place, and of course, that means hot chocolate! Zanna really enjoyed getting to have her own cup of hot cocoa by the fire, and Daddy had fun playing with the settings on my camera! I love the look on Zanna's face in some of them while drinking the hot cocoa- a look of pure joy! Glad to pass on the love of delicious hot chocolate on a cold wintry night with my pumpkin!

It's Shake and Bake...

 
 
 
 
And I helped :)
Zanna loves helping in the kitchen, and the other day we made Oatmeal Raisin cookies to bring to Zanna's friend Thomas and his family (we call them Zanna's Wednesday Family)... she had such a good time mixing, pouring, and then tasting the cookies! YUM!

Big Girl Bed

 
 
 
 
Zanna got a big girl bed just before Christmas. She loves it and does very well in it. I find some of her choices of sleeping positions hilarious, so I caught some of them on camera.... one night, I came in to find that Zanna had very carefully placed Baby Sarah and Baby Bo on the pillow and she herself was sleeping just on the mattress near them... I can't believe our baby's so big!

The tradition of the Christmas Banana

 
 
 
In our house growing up, Santa Claus always left a banana in our stockings and we have many pictures of us chowing down on bananas in Christmas PJs. Santa knew that this tradition was important, and left bananas for everyone at our house too (smart cookie, that Santa!) Here's Zanna eating her "bo-nana"....

A thing of Beauty

 
The Christmas Country Ham......
Yum.

Christmas Joy

 
 
 
 

We thoroughly enjoyed Christmas this year! All of the grandparents were here, all of my siblings plus Em's boyfriend Chris whom we all loved getting to know. It was a FULL house! Everybody came to FPC for worship on Christmas eve and then we had a delicious country ham dinner that Cam had slaved over for literally 48hours, it was AMAZING. I have a picture that I'll post of it- mouth watering! Zanna got some Dora Christmas PJs and a play kitchen for Christmas... she loves making soup and washing her hands in her new kitchen. Daddy's going to have a little chef to help him in the kitchen! My favorite memory of this Christmas was Zanna waking up on Christmas morning and saying, "Open 25! Open 25" All of Advent we'd opened a door on our calendar each day and found a character from the nativity scene or another Christmas treat (a snowman or even sometimes a Kiss)and Zanna loved doing this each day. On Christmas eve, we talked about what might be in the number 25, and she just couldn't wait to open it.... so, when everyone arrived on Christmas morning, before she even noticed her presents, she wanted to "open 25"... and guess who was there, BABY JESUS! She was beyond excited. :)I love that.