Christmas Week!

Sabine had an incredible Christmas this year, spread across an entire week. We did a family celebration on the weekends on either end, to spread out the wealth a little, and had Christmas morning at our house on Wednesday. It went beautifully, and I think she really appreciated more of her gifts by having it all spread out a little.

The first weekend was with Aunt Dani, Nana Lin, and the cousins.



They cooked a beautiful dinner, and then we exchanged some presents.





A ballerina doll from Nana and a Katniss Barbie from Aunt Dani were some of the highlights:





Sabine has played with both of them a LOT!

We gave cousin E a Sit-n-Spin, and he had a blast with it--both Daddy and Sabine helped spin him around, and he kept asking for more.





Sabine also got some great dance and art supplies from Great Aunt Diane.



There was also a cool fairy village, that she set up the next day.



Later in the week, on Christmas Eve, Grandmom and Grandpa came down to spend the night. You can't tell from this blurry picture, but Sabine was a ball of energy. The Christmas Spirit can be QUITE EXCITING.



This is the only moment Sabine was still enough to get a picture with the Christmas tree...and that was only with some bribing.



Still, I think it's a good memory!

Christmas morning, she was up bright and early. 5:20 AM. Ooof. Normally these days she's sleeping until 7:00 or so, but I think the urge to visit the potty woke her up, and there was no going back to sleep after that!

We waited for a little longer before waking Grandmom and Grandpa up, then went downstairs.



Santa arrived, and, in fact, put out presents under Sabine's little tree as well! (Including the requested cash register and snow globe.)







Nana Lin, Aunt Dani, and the cousins came for brunch, and it was fun having all the family together.



We had our first, but hopefully not last, Yule Log cake this year. (Very pregnant mommy was probably the most excited about it.)



But hopefully everyone had a good brunch.







Sabine even had her juice out of a champagne glass.



On Thursday or Friday, Sabine realized she had completely forgotten about her stocking, and that Santa also put presents in there, so she had a fun time opening those, and partaking of the goodies inside.



Then on Saturday, we went up to Grandmom and Grandpa's house for a celebration with them.







The BIG present was a doll bed station, where Sabine could feed, bathe, cloth, and put two babies (and one bunny) to sleep at the same time.









Among many other lovely gifts, she also got a hand-made sweater from Grandmom!



(If you noticed the dress, it is an actual dress from Switzerland that mommy wore when SHE was four!)

And a marble run, that she liked, but I think mommy and daddy have had just as much fun playing with, so far.
;-)



There was also the annual running of the trains, both the smaller one upstairs under the tree and the big layout downstairs, but mommy wasn't able to lumber down the stairs this year to get a picture.



Sabine also noticed the guitar for the first time, and had a great time playing for Grandpa the rest of the day.



We had a sleep-over, as Sabine put it, and a delicious dinner and breakfast, before coming home to really delve into playing with all the new things and starting the clean up process from such an elaborate and lovely holiday.