Christmas happenings

This sort of wraps up Christmas for me.  The decorations are coming down today.  Bee (wearing her current favorite shirt) and Lou made a living nativity set one evening while I got dinner ready. 

It's well labeled.  She's Mary, the mother of Jesus.  Lou's sign says he's Joseph, the earthly father of Jesus. 

Then I saw this guy in the recliner.  No label.  Must be the shepherds watching over their sheep at night?

Mary and Joseph cuddled the baby.  Then, as with anything they do.  It goes from sweetly cuddling a baby to this....

Bee had a lovely program at school. 

 Lou had a program too, a different day. I arrived an hour early and had to sit several rows back.  The first seven rows were saved with end to end ipads.  Someone suggested they might be door prizes for early arrivals!  This seems to be a common trend at their school events, rows and rows saved with scarves and purses and not a person in sight.
 

The preschool put on a lovely Christmas program too.  The kids sang two songs, did a little rhyme and then there was a nativity 'play.'  Check out Mary's shoes!

This was dress rehearsal, but they were precious.

Too sweet not to sneak a photo of the kids at the library in here.

Lou and I volunteered at church loading food into trucks to be delivered to the food pantries for Christmas season.  He had a really, really fun time.  He loaded and carried as much as the the grown men. When our work was done, he asked for more.  We worked and worked and went home feeling happy.   I need to find more opportunities for him to volunteer!  Bee wasn't felling well and stayed home with daddy.  We all went Christmas caroling the next weekend and had an equally good time.

With family in town, we did some fun things.  My siblings and I like to give an actitivy to each other rather than a gift. 

We went rock climbing.  I'm in the green shirt, Bee is in pink, Lou in grey.  My sister is in the yellow shirt.

We gifted everyone a hockey game. 

Bee got to go out on the ice with friends during one of the breaks to pick up colored pucks. People throw the colored pucks out to try to win prizes. Her friend in the pink won an Ipad! 

Here's the fam.

Bee wanted to get her photo taken with the ice hockey girls. They are like a non-cheering cheerleader.  Hostess girls really. 

 
Bee got a play for Christmas from us.  It's American Girl and pretty vintage.  It's called a theater kit.  I've had it on hand since just before she was born. Turns out she has a flair for the stage!  I did a quick google search and it looks like they still sell them.  Here are the actresses (and director Lou) from the play at curtain call.  Daddy and uncle Dave were the tech crew.  This one was called Hairum Scarum, I'm searching down others as we speak!

Moving on to