Christmas

We went back to Elise's house for Christmas. Cora was so excited the morning we finally told her we were going to Auntie's house - ever since Thanksgiving she had been asking to go to "Cowa's aunties house" and naming all of her cousins every time we got in the car. She cried when we told her we were going to Cora's new house instead of Auntie's house when we moved. She has an especially soft spot for Alex and Matthew, although she loves all of her cousins.

Here are a couple of random pics of Cora playing at Elise's. I love her hair in pigtails and ponytails but since I have to wrestle her to do it, and also since it seems to damage her hair a lot, I don't do it very often. It's getting so long now, as you can see by the length of her pigtails.Trying on Grandma's shoes.Ryan and I celebrated our 6th wedding anniversary while we were in Boise - Elise gave us an early Christmas present of a gift card to Macaroni Grill so we went there while she watched Cora for us - it was delicious and a really nice evening out. I can't believe 6 years has gone by already. It was a great 6 years and we can't wait to see where the next 6 will take us.

On Christmas Eve we read the Christmas story, sang some Christmas hymns, and then opened a present. Ryan's family has a tradition to open one gift - usually PJs. Ryan's parents got Cora a cute Rapunzel nightgown/dress-up outfit complete with dress-up shoes the light up. After that, we had to have a dance party.

Cora got spoiled as usual at Christmas, as did Ryan and I. She had a little bit of a slow start, since we woke her up much earlier than she would've woken up on her own, so she could start at the same time as her cousins. But once she woke up she was pretty excited to open her presents and she is pretty good at it now - she even helped Ryan and I open ours.

We tried to teach Cora about what Christmas means and I think she learned a little - she got really good at identifying baby Jesus in nativities and she talked about Jesus' birthday party several times. We followed my mom's tradition and made a birthday cake and sang "Happy birthday" to Jesus.

Here is Cora and Grandma the day after Christmas, after church.

We missed my family at Christmas but were glad to escape the epidemic that we heard occurred in Ohio with everyone else. We are grateful that we were with family and we look forward to seeing my mom soon when the baby comes in the next few weeks.