christmas 2012. { nini's house }

As usual, Christmas was busy this year.  We left Minneapolis Friday afternoon and drove to my dad's house.  He was gone for the night so we got settled in, got Olive to sleep, and relaxed.  In the morning my dad had the coffee pot all ready so we just had to press brew.  That was nice.  :)  We took our time getting ready and headed over to my mom's house.

I'm busy (what's new?!) so none of these have been edited.

Shortly after we arrived my mom was ready for Olive to open her gifts.



She got sidewalk chalk:



Nesting/stackable M&D alphabet blocks, which happened to be what we got for her friend Ethan:



She pointed to something:





Nesting measuring cups and spoons for her kitchen:



Something grabbed their attention:



A dress that Nini got for Olive to use as a smock:



She also got that antique wagon and a new baby doll:





Wally used his man knife to help open something:





Gwen looked on with eager anticipation:



Oh my goodness.. more gifts!



Books:



A new hat and scarf:



We gave Wally a new pair of slippers:



Nini got some new boots:



And a big box of seaweed:



Oh I wonder what this is.......



FOOTSIE PAJAMASSSS!!!!



And a pair of slippers for Nini too:



Foot model:



Olive searched for more gifts in the wagon:



New clothes:

\

More books:







Nini was quite festive:



After a little break we worked on food preparation and then got ready for a little surprise for Olive.  So we asked her to close her eyes:



It was hard, she had to wait for a while.



But she did a great job.



Taking it all in:



And a dash out of focus towards the floor:



A baby bed and stainless steel pots and pans!



I bought them for my mom from IKEA and brought them with us.. so they weren't with the other gifts and weren't wrapped.



She didn't seem to mind.



She immediately started tucking the pots and pans into the bed with her baby.



And then wanted to get "tut in" as well:



Nini felt a little sleepy as well:





We took another break to work on food and then the rest of the family showed up.  After our delicious meal we exchanged more gifts.



Olive quickly made friends with my cousin's son, Chaz.  He was the next youngest there.. so maybe that's why.  She played with him a lot and always had to keep an eye on where he was.  She opened up this dress and immediately ran over to him to make sure it would fit:







Olive helped to make some gifts for my cousin's daughter, Shaylynn.  Here she is showing it off:



One of the gifts was a picture frame that Olive painted so I'll be fixing up this photo and sending it to Shaylynn to put in the frame:



A BUNCH OF PLASTIC FOOOOOOD:





My mom's friend, Barbara (in the chair), came over along with her mom (granny) and her daughter (Nichole).  My grandparents and granny and her husband were all friends and their children (my mom, her siblings, Barbara, and her brother) were all friends.  And their children (myself, my cousins, and Nicole, her sister, and their cousins) were all friends.  This was taken just before Nicole had to leave. She's been helping Wally out with some home repair projects recently - I'm so glad she has been able to help!



This is Wally telling a very inappropriate story about an apron:





Wally got this thing:



Doesn't he make you want to own one yourself?



My aunt Diane absolutely hates to be in photos.  Chaz keeps trying to get her with his phone:







Olive got a pink coat for next winter:





There's granny:



Olive got this outfit from Granny.  She got the same outfit for her great granddaughter, MacKenzie.  She lives in New Mexico.  She was born the day before Olive (on my dad's birthday) to my childhood friend, Samantha.  Barbara (pictured previously) is her grandmother, and Nicole (pictured previously) is her aunt.  Samantha, Nicole, and I spent a lot of summers together at Granny's house when we were young.