not-quite-25-days of Christmas

Last year I read about Andrea's 25 Days of Christmas and loved the idea, but with planning a solo cross-country trip with three kids (remember that one? F-U-N!), I didn't quite have the time/energy/will/desire to play along. This year, with our trip to Curaçao and not returning home until December 7th, I'd kind of written the whole Advent thing off for this year, too.

But then Christmas-y things just seemed to keep happening to us.

So I present you with Days 1-3 of our abridged 14 Days of Christmas...

Day 1: We set up the Christmas tree and put the lights on while watching "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer".

*sorry, no pictures*

Day 2: A kids Christmas/cookie decorating party with some friends from the embassy. The kids got to play, decorate gingerbread cookies, play, eat, play some more, and then have a gift exchange. After a nap/sugar crash, we headed to the Usaquen Market to see the wares, have supper and see the lights in the park after the sun went down.

enough sprinkles, Simon??

our fellow decorators/sugar-eaters

Day 3: My pregnancy-induced insomnia and general exhaustion kept us from being ready for church on time this morning, so we put on some Christmas music and FINALLY(!) decorated the tree. After fresh fruit and eggs for brunch, Andrew had a nap and Liam went down to the courtyard to play soccer with some neighbour boys while Peter and Simon were able to spend some one-on-one time playing Snakes and Ladders. I was busy making cookie dough (this recipe, doubled) that Simon later helped me roll while Peter taught Liam how to play Risk. As I type, the game is wrapping up (if they're able to keep Andrew from destroying the board), there are five tummies full of ginger cookies and the sun is actually shining here in Bogota. (ETA: the sun didn't last *sigh*)

"What do you mean I'm not supposed to throw these?? THEY'RE BALLS!"

Now to figure out Day 4...