Christmas with Elise

We had a really great Christmas this year! Partly, I think, because Elise actually stayed awake this time, but for the first half an hour - life was great...then our sweet little girl switched into toddler terror mode and started to jam her stroller into bizarre places and scream out in fits








of rage. However, after some "quiet time," she was able to handle the rest of the day (or maybe I should say we were). I really think that if we would have kept it to two or three presents, she would have been just fine :) We were really blessed this year. Despite Rand's not having a job for a good portion of the month, we were still able to have an awesome Christmas, and Elise got a lot of things she just can 't live without (namely the baby you see in the scary position on the pink swing - that smile is deceptive). We had a lot of fun and it was nice having a white Christmas (it snowed all day and was beautiful!).




Elise picked up the word "santa" pretty quickly. Whether it was out of sheer terror that everywhere she went was an old, hairy guy who wanted her to come near him, or just the fact that he's a fat guy in a bright red suit, was really indistinguishable... We went to the library to have Elise sit with him; needless to say, she wouldn't and started crying when he reached out to give her a candy cane. Santa followed up with "these kids are smarter than they look" :) It was pretty cute to watch - afterwards, she just couldn't stop saying, "santa, santa" :) I also like this picture of her on her brand-new potty. Rand calls it "the queen on her throne."