It's Christmas! And the Best Grandma in the World

This year Santa brought Adriana a dollhouse. It is huge and taller than her. She needs a step ladder to get to the top. That Santa! So generous.

We had a great holiday with family. On Christmas Eve, everyone came over to our house and we had dinner and made cookies for Santa. Adriana loves to help decorate cookies with her cousins.

Christmas ended with my Grandma staying with us for a week. Adriana loves her great grandma, who she affectionately calls Grandma Tumble Bug. Adriana loves to climb and jump on the couches (who doesn't?) and my Grandma calls her a tumble bug. Adriana thinks it is hilarious and now calls her Grandma Tumble Bug. She is very fun to have around. She will sit and play whatever Ade wants, for however long she wants. I get so much done when she is here. Organizing closets, cleaning. It is a super productive time for me. We are both sad to see her go. Adriana goes through Grandma Tumble Bug withdrawals. Not a fun time for anyone. :)

My Very First Gingerbread House

Before Christmas, Adriana and Rob decided to tackle making Gingerbread Houses. I bought the premade ones because, let's face it, I am not crafty and actually building the house seemed a little out of my league.

One night when I was out, they decided to make them. We had heard stories about how hard the pre made ones were, the frosting was awful and it would be a disaster. I must confess, it is kind of the reason I made it a daddy/daughter event. But jokes on me, because they made them and had a great time. Adriana did her own, all by herself. Rob put on the frosting and she decorated it on her own. It turned out great. Very uniform and symmetrical. Our little perfectionist.

Christmas Tree, Zoo Lights

Going inside the Hippo, she talked about walking out his bum the whole night...

May the Force be with You! This Elephant light led our way through Zoo.

Decorating Tree

Like clockwork, the tree and Christmas decorations were up the day after Thanksgiving. Adriana had a lot of fun putting all the ornaments on the tree with Daddy.

We also took our annual trip to Zoo Lights. It was about 30 degrees which is about 30 degrees warmer than any other year we have gone. So while it was cold, Rob and I felt like it was springtime. This year, because it wasn't so cold, they were running the Train and Carousel so Ade had a blast. The lights are amazing. We got to see some animals. It was a great night!

Zoo Lights

Here are a couple pictures of us at the zoo lights last night.  It was freezing, but Adriana loved it, she was bundled up like the kid on the Christmas Story. :)  She ooo'ed and ahhh'ed at all the lights and animals.  She loved the giraffes.   She was so tired but cried and pointed at the zoo as if we were taking away her favorite toy when we left.  It was a lot of fun.  Ally, Grandpa and Aunt Tara joined us.   Luckily Santa was there as we had not taken her to see him yet.  We tried at the mall but it was so chaotic we decided not to.  We were feeling like terrible parents for not having the 1st Christmas-kid screaming on Santa's lap picture.  She actually didn't mind.  Ally sat with her so that helped a lot.  

Christmas Train

This weekend on the Christmas Train at the Colorado Railroad Museum in Golden.  

Christmas baking

So this last weekend we decided to start making Christmas goodies.  That is really not an Etchepare thing to do but now that we have Adriana we seem to be doing a lot that we normally wouldn't.  Rob found a recipe for peppermint cream cheese brownies.  They were amazing.  Adriana was very helpful in the process.  As you can see we almost ended up with little fingers in the batter.   The wisk was really her favorite thing.  She was quite intrigued by it.

This week is sugar cookies.  We will see how it goes.  I bet she will love to help with the frosting.