Christmas trees and new favorites

Just as I had suspected, miss Abrielle absolutely loves the Christmas tree! She seems mesmerized by it, and it gives her something new to drool over in excitement;) Luckily she is not pulling herself up or anything like that yet, so I think it should be fairly safe for her as long as we're always there to make sure she doesn't pull ornaments down and into her mouth!

Considering Abrie is already mesmerized by the Christmas tree, it means that- yep!- Dan and my big girls put it up yesterday afternoon. I knew they were thinking about it and that Dan had mentioned it to Maddie and Faith yesterday morning. And, I should have definitely known something was up when Abrie and I got back from the library yesterday afternoon and all was quiet with the lights dimmed in the living room. They were hiding behind couch pillows and snickering quietly, and yelled "Ta Da!" as Abrie and I reached the top of the stairs. They were very proud, and this was Dan's first undertaking of putting up the Christmas tree alone. It was such an ugly day out yesterday anyway, that it was a good project for them!

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Totally unrelated, but our Maddie has gotten us all hooked on Honeycrisp apples. I thought I had tasted every single type of apple in my life, until Aunt Lisi brought over some Honeycrips about 3 weeks ago and Maddie tasted them for the first time. The girl (who loves apples-- she always wants them whole, and wants them washed the way Gepetto does in 'Pinocchio' which would means she wants to wipe it clean with her sleeve!) has now snubbed all other apples for the most part, and insists on only Honeycrisps. The apples are too darn good. It's like drinking apple cider straight from an apple! I just picked up some Jonagald's this morning (since the Honeycrisp were not on sale), and what would have otherwise been a huge treat for Maddie turned into "but, but, but, but... they're NOT HONEYCRISP!!"

Another new obsession of the big girls is "The Sound of Music." They just love that movie! I was finally able to get it through the interlibrary loan, and we have it for a week. They've been watching it non-stop, but not the whole movie of course. They love all the parts where the kids are singing, and even Faith has the "So Long, Farewell" song memorized. It's cute when she says "Cuckoo, Cuckoo" all the time!