Tis the Season!

I know it's still November, but I'm jumping full force into the Christmas season this week.  I'm off of school for the entire week, so I've decided to immerse myself into Christmas.  It's not really hard because I aboslutely love Christmas time!  Once I'm into it, I kind of want to stay all year.  I've been known to keep up my Christmas decor until February before, and I'm not ashamed to admit it.  Yesterday was some pre Thanksgiving day sale shopping.  Today was visiting Santa day!!

Bailey was so excited to see Santa!  She's never been afraid of Santa or any other giant character people dressed up at theme parks.  She's just very intrigued by all of it.  This year she completely grasps the idea of Christmas, Santa, and the whole deal.  Brian even started using the "I'm going to call Santa" routine to get Bailey in line.  He called Santa about 10 times on Sunday to keep her from crying, throwing a fit, or whatever naughty/negative behavior was being demonstrated at the moment.  He even found a picture of Santa holding a cell phone to show her when he's calling Santa.  I told him that it's a little too early to start that bribery, but it works.  I even used it today when she was not talking nicely.  I called Santa and right away she stopped.  Then she wanted me to call him back to tell him that she was being nice, so I did.

We met Becky, Hailey, and baby Chloe at the mall for the Santa event.  The thought was that if Hailey saw Bailey being friends with Santa, then Hailey would walk up and talk with him too.  The plan didn't work because Hailey clung to Becky for dear life and would not even be coaxed down by candy.  You know a kid is seriously afraid when they won't come down even for a piece of candy.

Here's Bailey trying to talk Hailey out of her stroller.

While we were trying to convince Hailey to see Santa, Bailey just ran right up and started chatting with him.  I wasn't even ready with my camera crew (Toni and Mom) to start taking pictures.  My child is fearless--sometimes a good thing, but sometimes a bad thing.  She just walked right up and had a conversation with the jolly man.  On the way over to the mall, she said that she was going to tell him that she wanted a dolly, some toy games, and of course candy.  Last year we saw Santa so many times throughout the season, that she thought Santa = candy.  I had to tell her that she wasn't actually going to get the presents today, but just ask for them.  I kind of thought she might think that he was going to pull her requested presents out of his bag right there.  She was okay with that idea as long as she got some candy.  He gave her a candy cane and then she sat on his lap and smiled patiently waiting for the picture.  She was so excited that her smile is extremely fake looking, but I kept it because that's how Bailey is.  She can be kind of a poser with pictures, which sometimes results in fake smiles.  But I'll take 'em!  Then she immediately wanted to eat her candy and like  nice little girl, she then waited again (there was now a line) to go tell Santa thank you for her candy cane.  She wouldn't want to miss out on any presents just because she didn't thank him.  Toni got in trouble for taking pictures with my camera in front of the fence, but who cares?  We bought the picture and then went on our merry way.

Seeing Santa the week of Thanksgiving is one of the best little Christmas tips that I know.  You can almost always walk right up; you might have to wait a few minutes, but nothing like the first year I took Bailey.  We took Bailey and the twins and we waited for about an hour in line.  By the time we got to the front the twins were so petrified that they wouldn't stop screaming.  So I learned from that first disastrous year and now go my week off and it's quite an enjoyable time.

Here's an artsy shot by Toni of Bailey sprinting up to see Santa.  Click on it to make it bigger to see the pure joy and excitement in her face.

This was when we realized that Bailey was up chatting with Santa.  I love that she's giving him a hug, but keeping a pretty close eye on that basket of candy canes.

Here's one of Toni's illegal pictures in front of the fence--way to go Toni!

Bailey is posing with her candy cane.  I love her little pose!

 

Here she is waiting patiently with Grammy to tell Santa thank you for the candy cane.

Just too cute to pass up a chance for a photo op with this girl.  It's funny to see pictures of her now without her glasses.

What a difference a year makes!  Look at how much she's grown and check out all of her gorgeous long flowing locks!  I do love her outfit last year with her red sparkle shoes, but this year's is pretty cute too.  It makes me laugh to think about last year all she knew was that if she went up to talk to this strange looking man, she would get a piece of candy.  She's such a good sport about most anything involving candy.  I also think it's funny that it's the same Santa guy.  I wonder how much he gets paid; he is very good with kids.  Crazy to think that in next year's picture Bailey will be that much older and she'll be posing next to her little sister!  I'm excited just thinking about the matching outfits right now!!  So here's to the kick off of our 2010 holiday season!