Merry Christmas!

Ralls Christmas

Sort of. We took a short trip to Sandusky last week (we got the sweet minivan just in time!) to visit with the Ralls side of the family because we can't get together at Christmas this year. Annie had so much fun running around with her cousins (she actually passed out watching Phineas & Ferb in the car, which is completely unheard of for her). It was great to see everyone, and we're looking forward to next year when we have Zack and Treena's little one running around.

Mallory and Annie

Same chair, different cousins. Kate and Ella.

The big girls, Ella, Annie and Mal, eating popcorn.

The little girls, Kate and Madelyn.

Annie was really good at helping Pauline and Great Grandpa Ralls open gifts.

Courtney and Kate.

I just realized I have no pictures of the boys. I do have a great video of the girls and Brady playing Ring Around the Rosie Extreme, but still cannot manage to figure out how to get them on here.

Baking Cookies

Annie wanted to bake special cookies herself to leave for Santa. She was very specific in that we were going to make snowflake cookies to leave for him, and then make a few to eat ourselves. She loved the entire process until she got tried of frosting. :) We had a really great afternoon listening to the Disney princesses sing Christmas carols and baking the cookies.

The whoe time we rolled out the dough and cut out the different shapes, Annie kept saying, "Mom, I'm a really good baker!" She is a really good baker :)

I look freakishly tall in this picture. But don't the cookies look great?

Annie is also a really good taste tester!

Frankenmuth Part II

In addition to a world famous chicken dinner, Zehnder's also has a hotel with a cute little waterpark. We took the girls swimming the morning we left to tire them out before what we hoped would be a smooth ride home. They were both a little timid but had a lot of fun swimming and splashing and jumping.

Afterward, with a little transmission fluid additive, a wing and a prayer, we managed to make our way back to Ann Arbor. The ride home was bit dicey as once we got the car above 24 mph, we were afraid to let it drop below. This resulted in a few very wide, rather nervewracking turns, but Matt's driving was quite impressive and we made it back in one piece.

Where we then decided to trade the car in and buy a minivan. Minivans are cheap and incredibly practical. After some very savvy negotiating, Matt and I are now the proud owners of a new Chrysler Town and Country.

If you want a ride, let me know. We can fit half the world into this sucker. The girls love it, Matt loves it, and I've officially joined the ranks of suburban stay-home moms everywhere. And I'm not even 30.

Silly Kate

I have no idea what she was doing.

Frankenmuth

Matt was on vacation last week, so we took a little trip to Frankenmuth, home to both Bronner's-the world's largest CHRISTmas store and Zehnder's-with the world famous chicken dinners. The trip turned out to be rather exciting, so here it is:

First, we arrive in Frankenmuth with little fanfare. We checked into our hotel and headed to Bronner's to experience all it's holiday glory and to see Santa Claus. The line, which was actually quite short, featured about a million distractions for the kids. Here is Annie taking advantage of one of them:

And then it was time to see the big guy himself. Matt and I braced ourselves...

And here it is, perhaps the most perfect Santa picture of all time!

Kate really only cried briefly and spent the rest of the time just looking very suspicious. Annie quickly stated what she'd like (a princess piano, of course) and what Kate would like (her own chair in pink). The girls got free ornaments and everyone was happy!

Bronner's is pretty amazing and completely gigantic. We didn't even make it through the whole store. Kate lost interest. Outside the store, there were tons of decorations and Annie (I may have influenced her slightly)  made sure that we stopped at each one to take a picture.

Annie and the giant Santa

The girls with the giant snowman

Annie leading an Arctic expedition. (She posed like that all on her own).

Annie loves penguins.

After all that excitement, we headed to Zehnder's restaurant (we also stayed at their hotel, but they are about a mile away from each other). Everything was going fine until we realized that our car refused to go faster than 24 miles per hour. Frankenmuth is a really small town, so it wasn't a huge deal on the way to the restaurant, but Matt and I both knew that we were in trouble. We ignored that and continued on.

So we enjoyed a world famous chicken dinner. It was incredibly good. Matt, Kate and I loved it. Annie had macaroni and cheese. While we waited for the food, Kate played a rousing game of peek-a-boo with the table linen. She has really good manners. :)

The spots on the tablecloth were from Kate. Zehnder's was very clean and served tons of great food.

We drove at a leisurely 24 mph back to the hotel where the girls were very cute despite their parents' frantic calls to their parents to determine what could be done about the car. My very nice Uncle Jim gave us some advice, and we promptly all passed out from walking around a huge Christmas store and eating a huge Bavarian chicken dinner.

(Callista, I really liked that sweater :) Thanks for sharing your secrets.)

Back in Business

Our (Matt's) beloved bounce zone reopened recently. They had closed it at the previous location because it was apparently lacking a sprinkler system and thus a fire hazard. They reopened even closer to our house, and we've hit it twice lately to tire out the girls (and Matt).

Kate about to slide down. She loves the slides.

Annie going crazy. She didn't stop running, jumping and sliding for long enough to get a decent picture.

Kate showing her buddy Steve the ropes at the bounce house.

I have a great video of the girls sliding down a huge slide together, but I have no idea how to load it with the new Blogger format. Anyone??

Annie's First Movie

Annie saw her first movie in the theater last weekend. We joined the Meekers and the Reeds to see The Princess and the Frog. Annie loved it. She sat through it perfectly, although she was a little scared at times. She loved the popcorn, too. :)

Why We Didn't Adorn The Bottom of the Tree

I think Annie would be fine to leave well enough alone. However, Kate is a little instigator. She just can't resist the shiny ornaments. All decorations have now been moved up just slightly higher than Kate's reach.

Gingerbread Train

Annie has been begging for a gingerbread house since they came out in the stores. I was resisting at first, but when I saw how much fun our little friend Bella had with hers, I gave in. Annie decided at the last second to go with a gingerbread train, rather than a house. She had a lot of fun and ate tons of candy, but I don't think our train is going to be winning any gingerbread awards.

Getting started. Already into the candy. :)

The lovely finished product

It was copping a bad lean. It actually fell over twice, so we had to prop it up overnight with a fork until everything was good and dry. Matt and I are not exactly engineers.

Christmas Lights

We went to the lighting ceremony in our little town last week. Annie loves Christmas lights. She points out every single light we drive by, and each night she comes out onto the porch to watch us plug in our Christmas lights. Our tree lights are also always on. So, we (I) thought this would be fun, to see all the town's lights lit up at once. It was cold, though, really cold apparently. Matt and Kate were freezing, and we never did see the lights because Dexter isn't too great about sticking to their pre-arranged lighting times. Maybe next year...

Matt and Kate. They looked thrilled, don't they?

O Christmas Tree

Last year, I wanted to start the tradition of going out to a tree farm and cutting down our own tree. However, it was absolutely freezing and Kate was screaming all the time, so we just followed our old tradition of going to Lowe's and picking out a cheap, decent tree and calling it a day.

However, now the girls are older, there is less screaming and it's a bit warmer. So, I found a tree farm sort of nearby and off we went. After a 20 or so minute ride on a beautiful sunny day, we arrived at the tree farm. An incredibly friendly and helpful worker greeted us, lent us a saw and explained where to go. Then I realized I only had a debit card--no cash. So we gave back the saw and went on a hunt for an ATM machine in the middle of nowhere. We did eventually find one and started to head back, but not before it started to rain. Heavy, freezing rain. And Annie fell asleep in the backseat. Upon our return, the same friendly worker at the farm gave us the saw once again and bid us good luck.

We headed to the Frasier Fir section in this:

Despite the rain, we all piled out of the car. Like her father, Annie refused to believe my assertion that it was actually snow falling, rather than cold, freezing rain. She was not pleased. (Click on the picture to enlarge it and see the priceless expression on her face).

Kate did not seem to mind as much, though she did refuse to move/walk at all when I put her down.

Luckily, after just a few minutes, the rain did stop and we had an enjoyable time walking through the trees trying to find just the right one. Annie wanted this one:

(The saw was a prop. We were right there and took it away promptly. No need to call CPS).

Annie did mention that she was cold a few times (as did Matt). And Kate still was unsure about walking around in the trees. But it turned out just fine.

Matt was incredibly manly and cut down the tree in short order.

At home, we decorated while listening to the Disney princesses sing Christmas carols. Annie helped somewhat, while Kate ripped the top off all the decorative ball ornaments and then tried to eat them. This is the reason there are few to no ornaments on the bottom half of the tree.

All in all, it was actually a really nice day. The girls love the tree, and it was certainly an experience we won't forget. Matt can't wait for next Christmas to go tree hunting again!