Christmas Photo Shoot

Darn it! I've been so busy that I forgot to schedule a Christmas photo shoot for my kids. Usually, we go to Wal-Mart or Babies R Us for this. Unfortunately, everything is all booked up because I didn't remember to make an appointment way back in November. Oh well, I decided to create a photo shoot of my kids at home.

I'm sure they are not as great as the store bought photos would have been but it is better than nothing. I got the kids all decked out in their Holiday best put a chair with a plaid blanket in front of our tree and started snapping away. I gotta say, this was no small feat. I took a million pictures and only got a few decent ones. I would say there is only one that I would call good.

The flash on my camera wasn't going off at first, and then when I did reset it to use flash it took forever to take the picture! I can't tell you how many times I had the kids both smiling and looking at the camera only to wait an additional 10 seconds for the flash and get the awesome shot of one child talking and the other looking away. GRRRR!

Despite my frustrations, the kids were actually having a good time. Of course, by the end they wanted it to be done so I have to post some of them. It's funny to see Logan's look of disgust as I snap on even though he is clearly sick of the photo shoot and not cooperating. Lily said "Cheese!" the entire time but was busy looking everywhere but the camera.

Hey, at least I got a few to scrapbook. Maybe this will be a reminder to me to book my Christmas photo sittings early!

And now for the "Mooooommmmmm, I'm doooooonnnneee" photos.

Trimming the Tree

One of my favorite parts of Christmas is decorating the Christmas tree. For the first time this year both kids understood what we were doing and wanted to participate. It was so cute to watch how excited they were to be helping! They even started singing "Oh Christmas Tree" together while they were putting the ornaments on.

I also love to have Christmas music blaring while we decorate the house. There is just something so wonderful about listening to your favorite Christmas tunes while making the house look festive. We heard a lot of favorites while hanging up ornaments.

Logan had so much fun watching me put up the lights. He couldn't wait for them to be wound around the tree so that he could start hanging ornaments. As you might guess, the little ones had clusters of ornaments on the bottom and middle parts of the tree. Mike and I had to strategically rearrange the ornaments so that the entire tree got decorated. Of course, each of them had to help us put the ornaments "up high."
Every year I try to buy ornaments for the kids to put on the tree. Which reminds me that I haven't done that this year! I'm sure I will be able to find something really cute up at our local Thrifty White, they have the cutest gifts.
Anyway, it a tradition that they each get a new ornament every year and hopefully when they grow up they will take the ornaments with them for their own homes. Of course, if they want me to keep them, I would be happy about that too!

When we put the final touches on the tree we told Logan that this year he would get to put the Angel on top. This is the first year he has done it, usually it is Daddy's job. He was so excited to add the last ornament. "Oh, our tree is so beautiful!" both of the kids commented. They couldn't wait to start putting presents under it. I hope to get a few more good years of Christmas tree decorating excitement out of them before it becomes a chore. For now, I will enjoy the excitement of my little ones helping to make the season bright.

Picking Out the Perfect Tree

This year, we decided to do something a little different to pick out our Christmas tree. In years past, we went to Hansen Tree Farm in Anoka. Hansen is truly a lovely little tree farm but I found another really great tradition.

Woodland Hills Winery is my favorite little Minnesota Vineyard. It is located in Delano so it is only about 30 minutes from us. This year, Woodland Hills had a special event that featured Santa Claus, sleigh rides, Christmas Trees and Christmas movies.


We decided to kill two birds with one stone and see Santa and pick out our Christmas tree at the same time. The kids had such a blast! First, we went and picked out our Christmas tree. They didn't have a huge amount but the trees they did have were very nice. We got a blue spruce about 7 ft tall and it looks perfect in our family room!


Santa showed up at the winery with Mrs. Claus and visited with the children waiting to see him before getting settled for pictures. We were one of the first families to get our pictures done. It was wonderful to get pictures done in this laid back atmosphere instead of waiting in line for hours.

After we had pictures done we brought the kids into the wine distillery and they had Christmas movies playing. We then went out and waited by the bonfire for the sleigh ride. The kids had so much fun on the sleigh! It started snowing a little before hand so it was absolutely picturesque. Logan loved how the bells jingled as the horses ran and he led us in a rendition of jingle bells.

Finally we went home. I got a few bottles of wine to give as gifts, we got pictures with Santa, picked out a beautiful tree and went on our first sleigh ride ever! It was a wonderful day!

The "New" Sledding Hill

It was a Sunday, the kiddos were chasing each other around in circles and play fighting. It was driving Mike and I nuts. It would start out as good fun and end up with somebody crying. Every. Five. Minutes. We had to do something, anything! So we decided to take the kids on their first sledding trip of the winter.

We bundled everybody up, loaded up the sleds and headed to the Community Center hill. It was where we brought the kids for sledding last year. It is a perfect hill for the five and under set, not to high, not to steep and it ends in the middle of a soccer field with no frozen ponds or creeks nearby. (There is a steep, high hill that ends at the creek right up the block from us but we've always avoided it although it is a favorite amongst the older kids.)

I realized that I had forgotten Lily's had and she only had a sheer hood to cover her head. This sledding trip was not starting off well! We soldiered on anyway, prepared to leave after only a couple of trips down the hill. We went up to the gate only to find that it was locked! It is never locked! We went all the time last year and never had run into this hill being unavailable.

Then I remembered that during our summer "Park Project" where we went to a bunch of different parks in our area. Highwoods park was one of the ones we visited and it had a huge hill right by it. So, we made the trip home for Lily's hat. The kids were very upset thinking they weren't going to get to go sledding. We assured them that we had found a new hill.

I knew that Highwoods Park hill was a big one but I had forgotten how big! Luckily, one side is very steep and ends on a frozen pond, and the other side is high but not steep and perfect for little ones. When we arrived there was a group of teenaged boys going down the steep side and they had made jumps that they were flying off of as well. This hill is basically like a medium run at a ski resort.

Good thing that the other side was perfect for sending Logan and Lily down. At first, Mike and I went down with them but it wasn't long before they begged to go down together. We sent them down, and wouldn't you know it, they hit the only mini jump that had been made on that side. They LOVED it.

Logan went down many times by himself purposely going over the jump. "That was awesome!" he exclaimed after catching some air. No worries, they both were pros and we went home satisfied and tired to enjoy some hot coco. :)