Christmas Eve

We don't really play up the Santa thing at our house.  We talk about Santa as a fun tradition.  Even with our lukewarm Santa atmosphere, the girls were really excited to see Santa at the annual gathering of my mom's family on Christmas Eve.



(Years from now June will regret ripping out the clip I put in her hair.)


(And that is my darling nephew Bruce photobombing everyone's Santa pictures.)



The gathering is so large it is held in the gym of the church.  We set up tables and chairs for 100.  They were filled.  There was enough food for 200 people.


Grandma and Grandpa Ohio set up a giant bounce house for the kids.  And an xBox.  And a movie screen.  And a craft table.
My cousin painted nails...

BEST PARTY EVER!



Fun was had by all...

O Christmas Tree

We bought this lovely tree last year off of good ol' Craigslist.  It is big and somewhat lifelike.  It is somewhat pre-lit.  (Last year it was more pre-lit.)  This year a few strands of lights have lost their shine, so a few more strands were tucked into the branches.
We don't really have a theme to our tree... or maybe the theme is "stuff we like."

Our tree started out evenly decorated... the ornaments were spaced neatly around the tree.
And then the girls rearranged the ornaments...


By Christmas day, most ornaments were hung above the reach of Ruby and June... making our tree appear a bit top-heavy.
Oh well.
The ornaments are sort of magical.
My favorite childhood ornament...


From Andy's boyhood...


I made this from a map of the Chicago CTA.


And there are plenty of our kids' ornaments and antiques and fun momentos covering our tree.

Soon it will be time to take this tree down and tuck away all the little treasures until next year. 
Without the tree around, I guess the kids will have to go back to getting into mischief with other stuff. 

take a bow

Have I told you that Alli is taking violin lessons?  It's true. 
She has learned a zillion variations of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.
She had her first recital at the beginning of December.  She played Twinkle wonderfully. 
And now we are all looking forward to her working on other tunes.