Our 2024 Christmas season was soooo good!!! We had so much fun and made so many good memories.
Day one of our countdown was our Elf on the Shelf returning.
Our Elf was a prankster this year! Look what he did the first day that he came back to Kayla's Door.
This year we had different Kindness Challenges where were tried to do something nice for someone.
We went to a church that we've done events at in Brunswick and we picked a name off our their kindness tree and bought someone in need a Christmas present.
We also had slime treasure hunts! We had an advent calendar that had different numbers and 4 times throughout our countdown Kayla got to go on a treasure hunt to figure out her numbers to open.
The first hunt was finding bells with numbers on them.
Here she is tracking down her bells.
Here is what she got to open. She absolutely LOVED her slime days!
We wrote a letter to Santa on what Kayla wanted for Christmas.
Here is a copy of her note. The top thing she wanted was a rainbow doll that she had seen on commercial.
Our elf taking a marshmellow bath with rubber duckies.
Our next Kindness Challenge was going back to the church and helping pack up peanut butter and jelly sandwiches to people in need.
Here is Kayla packaging the sandwiches. She did it on her own and did a really good job. She was a good helper.
I believe that they pack 10,000 sandwiches a week. I think it was good for Kayla to come here and do a little bit of service.
Elf on her Barbie's balance beam.
A classic!! Bubble bath in the dark with just glow sticks as lights. This is such a fun one!
Next we went to the Stay a While Cat Shelter Christmas party.
We do this every year. We go there and play with the kitties, buy some baked goods, and give some money to their raffle.
We also pick a name off of their tree and then we go and get that kitty their presents.
Kayla's picking out the cans for her kitty.
Candy Cane hunt!
We went to the Carlisle Reservation and then drove around a bit looking at different Christmas lights. We were actually really impressed with the Carisle reservation... especially for being a free drive thru.
Picture stop.
Three girls.
Picture with Papa.
Our Elfie!
Kayla was making her letter to Santa.
We went to the Brunswick Rec Center with Maia. They had a lot of things to do there, but the lines were so long for stuff that you really couldn't do it all. We did get to watch a magic show while we were in line for the tattoo artist.
The tattoo is what the girls REALLY wanted to do.
The woman did a really good job... it just took a long time to get through her line.
Doing Maia's!
So cute!
They looked so adorable!
Getting to meet with Santa. Afterwards we went to Chuck E Cheese for a while too.
Next slime treasure hunt was following clues to find her numbers.
Making papa a christmas present.
She choose the Santa because she knows Papa really likes Santa's.
Decorating!
Next night was an easy night of watching the Grinch.
Can't pass up on our Christmas Tree brownies.
Kayla helped me decorate all of them.
Here are our creations.
Kayla got a response in the mail from Santa of the letter to sent.
Kayla got a bath bomb wand.
It was so cool and made the bath bomb distribute so evenly in the bath.
Silly Elf!
Cousin Christmas Party! Here is our Hot chocolate bar and different snacks.
Abby and Lucy.
Kayla!
Suzie
Charolette.
Lucy.
Bally girls in their matching jammies.
Kayla rocking her pjs.
All the girls in their pjs and ready to watch the movie.
Christmas popcorn mixture.
Girls eating their snacks and watching the movie.
Aunt Becky and I!
These days are so special and I'm so glad that they get these types of things to do!
Kayla and Abby have been wanting to have a sleepover FOREVER! So tonight was finally the night... we let Kayla go and the girls had a really good time. On the drive there Kayla said, "I've wished this for so long and my dream is finally coming true." I was excited for her and she did a great job and stayed all night just fine. I also got all her Christmas presents wrapped that night. It was the first time in her entire life that she was away from us for a night!
Elfie played a trick on her the next morning.
Her reaction to the prank.
Can't forget our cookie baking day!
Kayla helped a little bit, but overall wasn't too interested in it.
Papa was my big helper for the day. We made dozens and dozens of cookies.
We reused the parchment paper one time too many and actually ruined a whole batch of my super yummy chocolate chip cookies! Boo!!
We still had a lot of cookies that we made though.
Papa and Kayla helping decorate cookies.
Our next slime day, the number she needed were hidden in different pages of Christmas books. We had to read the books to find the clues.
Slime!
Annual Santa picture.
She also wanted one with her Elf.
And the Christmas Tree.
Elfie was with wedding barbie today.
Elfie left us a science experiment today.
It kinda worked out!
Marshmellow message.
Drawing on our bananas.
We went out to eat at TGIF's with Hannah and Maia.
Then we went to the Strongsville town square. It was snowing pretty good that day and the snow on the ground made it look beautiful.
The girls.
Mamas and babies!
The girls were in their tunnel.
Getting pictures with the different photo ops.
In the tunnel.
Smile!
Our annual ornament picture. Maia was ALL about making a big snowball.
She loved playing in the snow.
Kayla joined in.
Look at those big snowballs!
Hannah and Maia.
Love this one of Kayla and I!
Had to get Maia's giant snowball into the picture! We were going to go to the Hoag house in Strongsville too, but we had a late start and the girls were getting cranky so we abandoned ship and decided to call it a night. We did have a lot of fun in the city square though.
The next weekend it was getting COLD out! Like SUPER cold. And I didn't want us to get sick right before Christmas so we went out as a family and went driving around a route in North Royalton looking at Christmas lights.
I really enjoyed seeing the different displays.
Kayla fell asleep like a half an hour into it though!
The next day we did end up going back out with mom and doing the drive again.
We did go by the Hoag house in Strongsville. Even though it was freezing out... it was still packed there!
More pictures from our drive.
We loved this house that sang to different songs. Kayla really liked when Let it Go came on.
Opening up a present from TT.
Disney Barbie.
She put her present from Sarah and TT onto the tree.
Our final slime challenge was a combination of all 3 slimes. She had to find bells, read books for clues, and then do a clue scavenger hunt to find where the rest of her advent calendar was at.
Victory!
Baking papa's Christmas cookies.
Momma's helper!
Our last day with our elf!
Bye Elfie! We'll miss you! Thank you for the donuts.
Christmas Eve morning, Papa and Brenda came over. I made breakfast and we hung out with them for a couple of hours.
Opening her stocking.
Giving papa a hug!
Thank you for the presents papa.
She insisted on putting on her princess dress.
Photo Op time.
Now back into her Christmas dress.
The picture right before disaster struck haha. Papa told her to jump down and he'd catch her and it didn't turn out quite as planned...
Picture by the tree.
Being silly!
Papa, Kayla, and Brenda.
Selfie!
Later on Gigi came over to celebrate with us too.
Three generations.
The girls
Aunt Karen and Uncle Gary came over too.
Smile!
Gigi and Kayla. We had a nice Christmas eve dinner.
Santa came!
Cookies and milk are out... and so are the stockings for the next day.
Christmas morning
Her present from Santa.
She loved the giant LOL surprise.
So excited.
Helping daddy open his presents.
Opening up more of hers.
Rise of Red outfit.
She looooved this glitter tattoo kit.
This snowflake was soooo pretty! I was sad when it washed off.
Family picture.
This girlie aunt Karen got her was her favorite!
Playing with her new babies. We had a nice Christmas day at home together. We weren't rushed to go anywhere and took it easy. I had to go to work the next day so it worked out. We did miss our extended family though.
A few days later we were in Hancock celebrating daddy's birthday.
Aunt sissy was sick so she was wearing a mask.
Eric, Kelsie, and Neil.
Kayla cuddling Kelsie. We had a great Christmas season this year. We are so blessed to have so many friends and family that care about us.
