Cocoa with Santa & Mrs. Claus at the Art Center

 You have seen several of these on sister's blog, so I will try to tell you something new on this one.

Henry is really not so fond of strangers these days, especially men. I was just happy that he did not scream or cry when he was on Santa's lap. This was the best picture we could get of them with Santa.

Sister had to tell Santa what Henry wanted because he was scared and wouldn't say anything. But when Santa showed him his special pocket watch (it had people on a horse drawn sleigh in the snow being pulled around in a circle to music) then Henry started to warm up to him.

Henry did enjoy the cookies they had there. I think they each had three. Oye! 

Henry with his bell, which he lost before we even left the Art Center. 

Like I said, Henry is scared of strangers right now. So, he was unhappy about being so close to Mrs. Claus. I think next year it will all make sense to him that they bring him presents and he will like them a whole lot more.

Henry with his candy cane from Santa.

I have to say, I enjoyed this Santa event. I liked that there was a story (which Henry & I did go sit down for), and that Mrs. Claus was playing Christmas carols on the piano and there was hot cocoa & lots of cookies, and Santa took his time with the kids. Even though we waited a long time to visit with Santa because we waited until the line was almost done before we got in it because we didn't want to stand there for so long with Henry, plus the Art Center is so pretty. I would go back to this one again.

State School Orphanage Museum

Henry didn't get very much out of this except to see how much trouble he could get in to and if he could give daddy some more gray hairs

Decorating Sugar Cookies

Instead of making a bunch of cookies all at once, we just spend all December making them and eating them. We might not get to all varieties, but we get to what we get.

This was from last weekend. Sister helped me cut out sugar cookies and then we all decorated them, and ate them all of course.

Next up for cookies was Nutella Blossoms rolled in powdered  sugar (so they were like Peanut Butter Blossoms meet Snow on the Mountain Cookies).

Currently, chilling in the fridge is gingerbread cutout dough that we will make later today. I am plan to get to spritz cookies next weekend because I have volunteered to contribute those for the cookie exchange I arranaged with a bunch of other moms. So, we will soon have many more varitities to eat.

And I do need to make some candy, divinity and cashew brittle for sure! Probably not fudge this year since one of the moms is contributing that for the exchange.

Snowflake Crafts

Some of you might remember the paint snowflake from when I did it with sister. He had fun with these projects, but he doesn't have quite the sustained interest as his sister does. But we did get them finished, I just had to approach the white salt snowflakes from a different angle. Rather than spinkling salt on, he was more interested in it if he poured it all on and messged it around with his hands, then pour off & repeat. Just another reminder to me how much the children are different in their learning styles, personality & interests.