2nd Santa attempt

Kellen did this puzzle completely by himself - no one helped him! It's 60 pieces! And, he hadn't done it with help since he got it for his birthday in July. Great job!

The girls are playing "nigh-nigh." :) Doesn't Kaarin look cozy?

Our 2nd attempt for a picture with Santa...Kellen refused to get out of the stroller. We get one more chance, when we go pick up the picture (next week) they will do a retake for free. Watch for an update...;)

Last night we went to Barnes & Noble because they were celebrating the 25th anniversary of The Polar Express. They were going to read the book, have hot chocolate & cookies, Christmas crafts, etc. It was a BIG disappointment.:( The gal who read the book was a terrible reader, had obviously not brushed up on the book, & was extremely hard to hear. Plus she didn't do a very good job of showing the pictures. Then, they brought out the hot chocolate about 3 pages into the book, so she decided to take a break for hot chocolate. Not really a good idea when you have 25 1-7 year olds already sitting nicely...she should have just finished the book. Anyway, my kids didn't really sit for it, but mostly because I led them astray.:) Kellen went to play trains & the girls looked at books & loved on stuffed animals.:) Well, mostly Kaarin did that.:) The 'Christmas crafts' that they had were coloring Christmas dittos. No thanks. The only thing that was great was they gave each child a 'polar express' bell. The kids were VERY excited about that.:) But everything else was a bust.

And our 2nd attempt at Santa didn't go very well either. Apparently we only have 2 children this Christmas.:) Kellen flat out refused to get out of the stroller, & totally freaked out if I tried to move the stroller closer. Not even the bribe of a present from Santa could lure him there. Hmmmm. It may have helped if I had known that he was sick (he'd had a runny nose, but after his nap that day he had a fever of 101), we probably would have gone a different day. We have one more chance: when we pick up the pictures we can do a retake - AND go straight to the front of the line!:) I don't think it will matter, he already has his mind set against it. But I am always willing to try!;)