The Peipert Family: The Fourth Week of Christmas

Our final week of December was the best of them all! It also went by the fastest but it was the beginning of a great holiday season for the girls and included Janie's first Christmas! She is basically a blur these days so I didn't capture too many cute moments of her, but we enjoyed it just the same!

My girls!

We started off the week with mostly business as usual. The girls went to school so that I could take care of some things around the house and wrap up all of the items on the to do list before the fun began! It was a long, hard day of work for me and basically non-stop from the time I got up to the time I went to bed, but everything got done!

The presents wrapped under the tree!

Nora and I had an appointment at the dentist, which went surprisingly better than it could have. Nora let the nurses look in her mouth and even brush her teeth a little bit. She was super thrilled to come home with a new toothbrush!

She picked the blue one out herself.

Justin and I actually went out solo to celebrate the birthday of a great friend! We saw "It's a Wonderful Life" on 35mm film & went out for drinks and fried chicken & waffles afterwards. It is a rare occasion and we had a blast celebrating Gordon!

Awe.

THEN... The festivities began! We celebrated Christmas FOUR times over the course of my two week break and it was fantastic!!

Some of our memorable moments from Christmas:

1. Celebrating Christmas with grandparents and aunties, which included lots of spoiling with gifts! The girls love their Grandma, Grandpa, Mimi & Pops, and all their aunties, and they treat the girls so special. It is amazing having close family for the girls!

Nora opening a present from Grandma.

A tricycle and an art smock!!!

Janie discovering her gift from Grandpa lights up!

A clear photo of Janie - it just had to be included.

The girls!

Janie loved the paper so much that she ate it sometimes!

2. Going to church on Christmas Eve. This is one my favorite services from the whole year and although I will admit that it was less enjoyable this year than in the past (baby plus lit candles plus approaching bedtime does not equal peaceful service for mommy), I still love going to sing Christmas songs and listen to the story of the birth of Christ!

3. Meeting baby Evan for the first time! I am so happy I got to hold our friends' sweet little boy and love on him for a bit. He was such a good baby!

4. Watching the Polar Express. I watch it every year at school but it was much more fun with the family.

Nora watched in her new slippers from Harper.

She has hardly taken them off since she got them!

5. We baked cookies for Santa & ate a few, too! We kept it easy with break and bake. Nora liked helping me with the oven mitt and placing the cookies on the baking sheet.

5. SANTA CAME!!!! On Christmas morning, Santa brought Nora an art easel (plus supplies) and a yellow present, which she requested! Inside were slice & bake Christmas cookies which, realistically, could have been the ONLY present that she got for Christmas this year. I could hardly get her to open anything else because she wanted to play with them and not stop. Janie received a puzzle from Santa and some other fun little toddler toys and both girls got super soft robes!

THE YELLOW PRESENT!!!!

Sharing Christmas cookies with daddy.

6. Annual breakfast with our dear friends & neighbors on Christmas morning. We love our little tradition of breakfast in our jammies! The kids exchanged gifts and I ate two helpings of cinnamon rolls.

7. Janie's first and Nora's third Christmas with family. The girls are so sweet together. Nora really loved Christmas this year. She liked opening the gifts and would play with each toy when it got opened. Janie loved playing with the paper.