Guest Blogger - Aunt Cat visits for the holiday

Three generations of red-heads on Christmas Eve

Addy & Lilly have said "Happy Birthday Baby Jesus!" approximately 400 times since I arrived last Wednesday. On Christmas Eve we went to church and they walked up to the nativity and wished Baby Jesus a happy birthday and then proceeded to have a little wrestling match over who got to hold Baby Jesus. They also enjoyed the electric candles at the service and kept turning them on and off. All in all I think they were very good at church; however, the irony of the two of them singing Silent Night was not lost on anyone in the congregation.

We left some cookies for Santa and some carrots for the reindeer and an Addy & Lilly dictated note that said (verbatim):

Writing our letter to Santa...

Dear Santa, Will you please bring me & sissy some gummis and some toys and some wine for Grandma and some french fries? Give Rudolph some carrots and enjoy the cookies and milk!

We had a little bit of a discussion about what Santa would like to drink, Lilly thought Santa would like a "cold beer." I think maybe someone needs to have an intervention with Addy & Lilly's mom & dad and grandparents.

On Christmas morning they were really excited to see if Santa ate the cookies and they got a note from Santa that thanked them for being such good girls and told them to have fun on their new bikes! So they ran into the family room and saw their new bikes - no tricycles here! They figured out that a much more fun way to ride a bike is to be pushed on the bike by an adult and have a race with sissy all over the house:)

The loot...Santa was good to everyone!

Lilly loved opening all her new books and gave them a quick flip through to make sure the books were to her liking. Addy loved opening up all her dolls for her dollhouse. They quickly zeroed in on their interests. They loved their magic fingerpaints from Uncle Jon - the fingerpaints only work on the magic paper - otherwise I think Mommy would have put Uncle Jon in a timeout. We made cupcakes together which was a little bit like the blind leading the blind - I told them I would have been better off making toast. A Christmas miracle happened and the cupcakes actually turned out pretty good!

Addy with a few of her new dolls

Baking Christmas cupcakes with Aunt Cat

Lilly with her new blanket from Jeremy's Aunt Cindy

Sadly they refused a nap on Christmas Day - but they were troopers through our 20 person dinner! They had a wonderful time at the party and seeing their family and "helping" to open up more presents.

My brillant, beautiful nieces are growing up though - they have opinions and god help you if you don't listen to them. They do operate on the whoever talks the loudest gets to speak rule. They each have a bit of a dictatorial streak in them and I think there is general consensus that they get that from their mom! They are so kind and loving - always giving hugs and kisses. I think we need to get Addy & Lilly run & hug on tv! They actually run at each other (olympic speed) and crash into a hug - all the while screaming at the top of their lungs "RUN AND HUG - RUN AND HUG!"

Addy & Lilly - I love you two! Merry Christmas and Happy New Year - Happy Birthday Baby Jesus! I cannot wait until I see you again - don't grow up too fast and try for the sake of your mommy and daddy to get some sleep - I think if you slept a little bit more mommy might need a little less wine and daddy might need a little less cold beer:)

Grandpa Ian with Lilly, Aunt Cat with Addy, checking out Baby Jesus in the church nativity