Before Christmas.

Brielle and Braden's preschool had a little Christmas party in each of their classrooms. It was hard to split between the two classrooms, Scott couldn't take off from his rotations so I did my very best...but I was sad when I got to Braden's class and I had missed the singing!!!:(

I saw plenty of singing from Brielle's class though! They did so well and Brielle knew the words to all of the songs, except she had the major 'wiggles' during the whole presentation!!! She was all over the place!!!:) Man! That little girl sure has lots of energy!

I got to Braden's classroom as fast as I could and this is how I found him! Having his little snack! If it would have been Brielle she totally would have noticed that I had missed her singing. I don't think Braden even realized! Which was good but I was so bummed that I didn't get to see him sing. It was a good day, nonetheless, and we headed to the chapel to have a Christmas sing-along with the rest of the preschool.

The next day, we had some snow! We bundled up and went to play.

As always, they had a blast in the snow.

Snow is always such a novelty to these children...

They, especially, LOVE eating it! They are just curious little monkeys!

I have to say, that these two have been so much fun to be around lately. They do and say the cutest things and I absolute LOVE and enjoy watching the camaraderie between them. They love each other so much. It's a wonderful and special thing to witness.

Oh my! Brielle even got on her knees to eat the snow off the ground! Crazy girl!

...and Braden decided to make snow angels.

When we got back from playing in the snow, we of course had some hot cocoa and then Brielle and Braden made some 'Snowflake Pie'. It was delicious and those two are pretty good little chefs!

Here they are, presenting their final product! Yum!:)

Scottie finished fall semester and finished his internal medicine rotation. We met up with him in D.C. and headed to Santa's Workshop.

Brielle had been having lots of questions about Santa this year and I think some of the kids with older siblings in her preschool were telling her that Santa wasn't real. One day she came home from school and told me: "Santa isn't real!" I was flabbergasted! She's too little still for the magic to wear off! So, I asked her, "Who on earth told you such a lie?" She insisted that she had come up with it on her own and then went on to say, "Santa isn't real but the elves are!" That's when I realized that the magic is still there for her!:)

After seeing Santa in his workshop, though, she was convinced that he is real!

...seriously though...look at this guy! I'm starting to get convinced that he is real myself! ha!:)

He looked so authentic and he had such a soft manner about him. He was a really nice Santa.

Braden was whispering really quietly what he wanted for Christmas to Santa...

Santa had to get a little closer!

Brielle, surprisingly, got a little shy and wouldn't tell him anything!

I think she was mesmerized that he looked so real!:)

We walked around the Ellipse for a little bit...it was a cold day, so we didn't last very long.

We watched the little trains go around the tree, let the kids run around for a little while and then headed back to the car... and back home to start packing for our next adventure:

Driving across the country!!!