The Basham Family: Pre Christmas Catch Up

I failed to write about Lily helping me decorate the Christmas tree this year.

She was super excited to help!

She did a pretty good job of putting the ornaments on. Well if the look you're going for is every single ornament on the same branch - then I'd say she did way better than "pretty good!"

She especially enjoyed helping Daddy put the ribbon on the top.

I'm pretty sure she was choking Joel with the way she was hanging on!

The kiddos sitting in front of the finished product.

I tried to get a picture but you know how that goes....

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Most of the time, dinner is a stressful part of the day for me. Trying to come up with something to eat that's within whatever points I have left for the day. Then hoping that at least Tyler will eat it. Then knowing that Lily won't so figuring out what to fix her instead. Then trying to get Lily to eat it. Then trying to remain patient while she makes 47 excuses not to eat. The most frequently used excuse: "I have to poop."

But sometimes, we have a good laugh at dinner time.

That's a "shit-eatin'-grin" if I ever saw one.

And that's an adorable grin. "Take my picture too Mommy!!"

We've been having a hard time with bibs on Tyler... he hates them and spends more time trying to remove them some nights than actually eating. Half the time we end up with a bigger mess than if we just went bib-less. So we tried an "eatin' shirt" but it was way too big and this is what he did with that.

Peek-A-Boo!

So then, of course, Lily had to get in on the peek-a-boo action with her napkin.

Peek-A-Boo! Haha!

Then Daddy had to show her how to be a bandit with her napkin.

Which she thought was hilarious.

(Take note of Tyler in the background of this photo....

he has the shirt pulled over his head. Goofball.)

Tyler thinks it's HILARIOUS to put his hands in his hair. This hairstyle is the result of pork and beans for supper!

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We've had a lot of fun with our Elf on a Shelf, Jingle, this year. I'll have to write more about him later, but he left this gingerbread house for the kiddos to make. They had a blast!

Tyler was most definitely more interested in eating the house and candy than building it.

We did decorate a little Christmas tree, but the candy lasted about 15 seconds affixed to the tree before Tyler ate it all off.

And then he went for the whole cookie. And let me tell you, these gingerbread house "cookies" are like barely flavored, hard cardboard. Didn't stop him.

I absolutely love it when he says, "Eeeeeeeeeese!"

Lily did pretty good decorating a gingerbread man. Of course she wanted to put pretty much all purple candy on it.

I thought Joel might have a meltdown when we started all this. See, he likes these houses to be perfect. He's IN to it. I mean, I'm OCD, bad, so I get it. But I go in to these activities knowing it's going to be a mess. Nothing will be symmetrical. The colors will not be balanced out. The sizes and placement of the candies will be all wrong. But it's ok. Cause, IT'S FOR THE KIDS!!

But Joel did chill out and relax after we got going.

Aren't we the most gorgeous gals you've seen all day?

In order to minimize opportunities for Lily's decorating to impact the structural integrity of the house (and to let Joel loose with his artistic icing abilities).....

.....I gave Lily some graham crackers and marshmallows to decorate. She made a snowman and some other random things.

Lily did end up putting quite a bit of the candy on the house, once the icing had dried enough that it didn't want to fall over if you looked at it sideways.

The finished house.

About half way through decorating the house, and approximately at the same time that the cardboard cookie was gone, Tyler was sick of sitting in his high chair so we let him loose. Of course, we were focused on the decorating and not on the toddler.

Mistake.

This kid loves this plant. Or rather, he loves to EAT THE DIRT from this plant.

The plant is really thriving. I wonder if it's because the soil gets turned over regularly and is watered with baby slobbers.

The next day, Jingle left another note, thanking the kiddos for his play house.

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Last weekend, I wandered in to Lily's room and she had barricaded herself and Tyler behind her table and chairs and told me that they were in her house and I couldn't come in.

I dropped what I was doing (probably laundry, so who cares?) and ran to get an old sheet and helped her build a "house."

She got the biggest kick of out of this. She kept inviting me and Joel to come in to her house. "All the way in. Not just your head."

That was no easy task, seeing as how neither of us are 3 feet tall.

But we did it. And it was fun.

And then it was nap time and she didn't want to come out of the house. So I put her pillow and blanket in there so she could sleep in there. That lasted approximately 6 seconds before she decided that she would rather sleep in her bed.

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Tyler has a favorite pastime.