Wow, that's a lot of Christmas pictures!

No text necessary, right? :)

Santa seems to think that *someone* is ready to use the big boy potty ;)

Charlotte got Milo a shark (or whale?) from Secret Santa.

Maya made matching princess crowns for Charlotte and I

She spent weeks (months?) making Christmas gifts for all of us.  They were all adorable.

She even made her own wrapping paper!

I was in a knitting exchange with 11 others and we each knit 12 of the same square, then exchanged at a fun party.  I attached them to make this awesome farm playmat for Milo!

Christmas morning breakfast tradition!

Maya's food restrictions made this year a bit more challenging, but she could not have possibly been happier than she was!  Gluten-free hamburger bun, toasted, add cinnamon/sugar, top with glaze made from powdered sugar and almond milk.  She was *stunned* at the amazingness.

Milo insisted on putting this shirt on immediately.  This was approximately 3:17pm

3:18pm :)

This toy has been quite the hit with Charlotte *and* Milo.  He often asks me, "can I check you?"

Way too big.

They opened tons of new toys, but the big hit for Milo and Eneko was the princess castle that Penny has had for well over a year :)  

She is quite the Rainbow-Loomer

Her first product (sorry for the terrible picture)

A password-protected journal.  "I've always been wanting one of these and now I have it!"

Kayla's new hamster, Carls (named by Maya).

Milo was enthralled.

We have another lego-lover on our hands.  I love how into building he gets!

That girl...

Goldie Blox (super fun!)

So, there was this time I watched some people jump out of a plane...

...and I took a bunch of pictures, and I told them I would blog about it and put the pictures in the blog, and then I took a major blog hiatus for, um, a long time.  But I'm back!  For today anyway :)  There's not much to say...it was insane seeing people (normal, or at least mostly normal, people) who I know and love jump out of a plane.  Like, a real plane.  In the sky.

Also, unrelated to the plane-jumping-out-of, we hung out at the hangar for the better part of a day.  I thought the kids would be completely falling apart by the end of it, but they were entertained by Patrick and his adorable girlfriend Kayla for pretty much the entire day.  It was awesome.  I'm pretty sure Maya thinks Kayla is her new BFF.

Pictures:

This isn't them, but it is people.  In the sky.  FALLING FROM THE SKY.

Laura lookin all chill before the jump

Milo looks like this a lot.  Especially when you ask him to smile for a picture!

The other reason the kids weren't falling apart ;)  Technology can be a beautiful thing!

There's something about little people in regular sized furniture that is hilarious to me.

pre-jump awesomeness

AFTER THE JUMP!

THEY DID IT!

Oh Christmas Tree, Oh Christmas Tree

Michael indulged my crazy on Friday as we took the kids out to hunt for the *perfect* Christmas tree.  All told, I think I did pretty good this year and we were in and out in less than an hour.  If you as him or the kids, though, I am pretty sure they will have a different story involving torture and hours upon hours of forced-tree-hunting.  In the end, we did end up finding an amazing tree that happens to be exactly the right size and just pokey enough that we're hoping Milo will not destroy all the ornaments (he has already pulled most of the ornaments off of the bottom of our artificial tree :/).  

Milo: "I eat snow off TREE!"

Me: This one is perfect!
Michael: Um, you mean the one that is 11 feet tall?
Me: There is no way that tree is that tall.  Stand next to it.
Michael: ...
In the end, we did not get the 11 foot tree.

When we finally found *the* tree, a surprise visitor was waiting for us!

MOM!  It's Polka Dot!

Milo has a healthy amount of skepticism for the creepy little elf.

The girls, however, cannot stop talking about him.

Maya and Charlotte wanted me to take their pictures and show them to Polka Dot, who was riding in my jacket to stay warm ~ adults can touch him, but children must not, lest he lose his Christmas Magic.

Yay tree!