Merry Christmas!

 On Christmas Eve, we headed to church.  Last year, Bryant didn't get dressed up, but went and sat up with all the kids when the parents took pictures.  This year, Bryant got dressed up (as a camel), but never wanted to go with the rest of the kids.

 When we got home, we had pizza and Christmas movies, then it was time to prepare for Santa to come.  Bryant put out milk and cookies for Santa and carrots and water for his reindeer.

 

If you remember the video from the last post, Bryant wanted candy canes from Santa.  Santa listened and left a trail of candy canes from Bryant's room to the tree where he left him some Thomas the Train toys.  I think Bryant was more excited with the candy canes than the toys!  He also thought it was pretty silly that the reindeers made a mess of the carrots:)

 

 

After he finally put down the candy canes, he was able to enjoy the Thomas presents from Santa

 

Santa also put slippers in his stocking.  He loves to wear them around the house and says that they give him big steps.

 

 After some breakfast, Bryant got himself dressed.  He has shown interest before in dressing himself, but on Christmas he was insistent that he did it all by himself and that continued through today.  Not sure why the independence all of a sudden, but it definitely tests my patience when I'm in a hurry!

 

He is so funny when he opens his presents.  He has to get all the paper off the present, one tiny piece at a time.

 

He was so excited with all his presents and wanted to "open it please" after he opened each present.  The skis, however, caused the biggest meltdowns when we a) couldn't go outside and ski right away and b) couldn't wear them when we opened all other presents.

 

Finally time to try out the skis!

the first fall...

much easier when dad pushes you!

 

I was expecting Christmas to be fun, but it far exceeded my expectations.  Bryant was too excited to take a nap, so he was in bed by 6:30 pm and slept a good 13 hours.  I think we definitely tuckered him out!

 

Today I started cleaning the house when Bryant was napping and when he woke up, the tree was out of the house.  He was so concerned and asked where the Christmas tree was.  Apparently my explanation wasn't good enough because he went and got his slippers and hat on and told me he was going to go shopping to pick out a Christmas tree.  Such a funny kid!



Conversations

Bryant was in a very talkative mood tonight to avoid falling asleep, so I recorded it so everyone can enjoy the fun coversations that we have with our kiddo.  But first, I have a few pictures from the past couple days that were on my phone:

Because who doesn't eat cookies in their Lego bin with a crazy hairdo?

Daddy got a new pair of boots - I think it will be quite some time before these two can share shoes!

 

And here are the videos...the first - singing Jingle Bells

 

 

Video Translation:

Jingle Bells

Jingle all the way

Old McDonald had a farm

Bingo was his name-o

 

In the next video, Bryant explains Christmas

 

 

 

 Translation:

Santa comes on Christmas, says ho ho ho, likes carrots and milk, drives a motorcycle, and is going to bring Bryant a candy cane.  (I think he says that because Santa gave him a candy cane when he sat on his lap and we saw a Santa driving around Helena on a motorcycle)

 

 

 

Santa!

On Saturday, we headed to the Carousel to get pictures with Santa.  I wasn't sure how Bryant would do since he was nervous with Santa last year and is still nervous around people he doesn't know.  To prep for our visit, we have been talking about Santa a lot and reading different Christmas books.  It must have worked because Bryant sat on Santa's lap and smiled!

 

He absolutely loved Santa and would just stare at him and smile.  He didn't tell him what he wanted for Christmas but did tell Santa that his reindeer eat carrots.

 

Wrapping Paper Swords!

That afternoon/evening, we went over to my parent's house for an early Christmas with my brother's family.  We had a delicious dinner!

 

One of Bryant's favorite presents was his Ninja Turtles "purse".  He put his cars in there and carried it around all night!

Yummy dessert!

 Grandma, Zoey, Reagan, and Bryant all got new bags, so we took a picture of them with their bags.  We couldn't get many smiles until Grandpa started being silly!

 

Grandpa joined in on the picture and everyone was singing "Jingle Bells". 

 

Bryant's class at daycare sang the same song.  I can't get the link for the video to work, but he was shaking his bells!  I don't think he sang a word during the video, but he's been singing it at home!

Playing cars in his purse

Bryant was thrilled with his new pair of Thomas pajamas!

 

He also got a t-ball set from Aunt Jen and Uncle Ryan, so we set it up today.  So much fun!

Nice hit!

Run around the bases!

 

We definitely have one excited boy who is ready for Christmas, especially now that I have wrapped presents and put them under the tree!

Christmas Cookies

The past couple years, my mom and I have gotten together to make Christmas cookies and this year Bryant was old enough to be interested in cooking too.  We can tell his arm is starting to feel a lot better since he wanted to roll out the dough for the sugar cookies.

 

I was actually worried about how I was going to keep his sling on for a month.  Even though he's always sliding his arm out and doing stuff with his right hand, he still always wants to wear his sling.  Now I'm worried about how I'm going to take it away in January!



He approves of the frosting!

This is his guilty smile as he took chocolate candies from the bag

 

 On Sunday, I got a wild hair to cut my boys' wild hair.  I did Bryant's first because he has a lot less hair, but I think both haircuts turned out really well.

 

And was apparently enough to wear my little boy out!

 

Bryant loves to pet Mocha, but especially so in the past couple days and right after dinner.  I don't understand why just after dinner, but it is cute either way:)

 

Similar to ornaments that I did when I was younger, my parents got Bryant an ornament that he could decorate with his handprint.  He was pretty proud of his snowmen fingers!

On Saturday, we also got to go see some real reindeer, but I couldn't get any pictures because I think the whole state of Montana came to look at them too.  He's gotten a couple Christmas books and learned that reindeer eat carrots so he's been talking about that a lot lately.  It is really entertaining having conversations with him as it seems like he learns so much every day and is definitely taking in a lot about Christmas.