ho ho ho

oh santa... we love you so... which is clear to see in the photos below!

i'm a poet and i didn't even know it!

2011

santa went badly at factoria mall and matt would not let me buy the $40 screaming picture. left to my own devices i for surely would have. boo! then this microsoft santa was just hanging out by the gate at the airport while we were waiting for our flight to reno! what?! and pictures with him were free! what?!?! he snuck in at the last moment... beckett didn't even know he was there. matt didn't want to be in the picture, but i make an adorable mrs. claus. ha.

2012

santa went badly at redmond town center and matt would not let me buy the $42 screaming picture. i wish i had it. santa went semi badly at crossroads mall (and matt haaaaaated this santa's non traditional clothing), but i got the picture anyways. this santa was for reals creepy. he kept trying to get me to be in the picture too and would pat his lap. hmm... no thanks, santa. 

2013

santa success! beckett looks the most adorable. the santa looks less adorable with his fakie fake beard, but whatevs man... who is even looking at him?

 

2014
so... here we are with two babes! this is my fave santa so far, he was legit! he "lives" in a cabin at university village. this wasn't the best beckett picture (what is going on with his hand?!), but it was the only picture where heath was not scream crying... so we'll take it!

side story! for months beckett had been prepping to ask santa for a real life pet frog. we had been researching frogs (which are gross...by the way) and had settled on getting him a small aquatic frog... basically on the same level as a fish, since it was his one and only request. i was less than thrilled about it. as we were waiting in the freezing cold for santa, an elf came out to chat with us and asked beckett what he was going to ask santa for. beckett told him he wanted a pet frog, but the elf misunderstood and thought he was asking for a pet rock. like the 80's gag gift? he laughed and was like, "oh, a pet rock, huh?" and that was that. beckett was like, "yes! a pet rock!" and instantly his mind was changed and he only wanted a rock... no frogs for him. okay then. you guys would not believe how low maintenance a rock is. thank you random elf for misunderstanding and making our lives much, much easier! that alone was well worth the trip to see santa!

merry christmas merry christmas

christmas eve

so i knew christmas would be better this year. b wasn't going to get everything about it... and that's okay because a lot of christmas stuff has nothing to do with anything anyways. and we talked about baby jesus a lot... so that makes me feel better. anyways, i was so excited to start family traditions, when christmas eve rolled around i could hardly handle myself. we made my oma's stroganoff for dinner and probably we will do that for christmas eve forever because it is super delicious. then we opened our christmas jammies (duh) which whitney made for matt and beckett this year and they looked like they were from the seventies and i almost passed out they were so frickin' adorable. beckett looked like a little man. thanks whitney... you are very wonderful. we also opened books (we do want, need, wear, read... so it's the read...) and here are matt and b just doing a little reading...

next we made cookies for santa. really, i made them... beckett sampled the dough. these cookies are my holiday favorites! they are too delicious. make them right away... gooey butter cookies

beckett picked cookies for santa and got a carrot for the reindeer.

this is maybe one of my all time favorite pictures. how adorable is he balancing that plate? this is what i imagined in my head when i thought about my future children. i die...

then he got eggnog for santa to drink.

then he said, "beckett has a tiny bit?" and drank all of santa's eggnog. poor santa.

he also wanted the feed the paper reindeer garland i made... so that happened.

then he went to bed and santa came!!! gah. i made picture tags this year, so that beckett would know whose gifts were whose and would be able to easily get his gifts and help pass out everybody else's. this worked super great. i highly recommend it for your littles and it looks pretty cute too. then we went upstairs and i sat in bed awake all night, anticipating what was coming. it was pretty perfect.

santa is coming to town

we took beckett to see santa. twice. two unsuccessful trips. the first time we went to redmond town center, where santa is inside a fancy house and a picture with him costs 1 million dollars. beckett talked to him and gave him high fives, but made a miserably sad pouty face when we made him sit with him. so we did not get that picture. we decided that was a practice run. and that maybe being in an intimate home setting was overwhelming. beckett still got a candy cane and we tried on some hats and got christmas gifts. the next weekend we went to crossroads mall where the santa is shadier and out in the open and weirdly still a million dollars for a photo. first we rode on some horses and we tried on hats again (weird) and got more gifts and then we went to see santa. beckett didn't cry. he was just sadly resigned. we got the picture anyway. two traumatizing visits are enough. 

santa at the airport!

so, we took beckett to see a santa at the mall, but he totally freaked out (expected) and matt wouldn't let me pay $20 for a screaming baby santa picture. i did video tape it though, so that will probably get posted on here soon. anyways, at the airport, microsoft had a santa that you could get free pictures with and i wanted to try again... even if it was another screaming picture, but matt thought it was a bad idea and would have none of it. so i went over by myself and tried to take a picture with beckett and santa. beckett was seriously skeptical, but not screaming, so a step in the right direction. i wish matt was in the picture too, so it didn't look like i was married to santa, but oh well. thanks for the free picture, microsoft. their photo editing software is actually pretty cool. ho ho ho!