Christmas Eve and Preparations for Santa

Tonight we celebrated Christmas with Cool Daddy-O's side of the family.  We attended church, came to our house, feasted on lasagna, and opened presents.  There's a long standing tradition from my side of the family that we're continuing with our children.  Prior to opening presents, we sit around the tree and a selected person reads the Christmas story.  Usually, this is read from the Bible, although other versions are acceptable if a child is reading the story.  This was Big Sis's first time reading the story and she read "The Stable".  
Not to be outdone, Lil Sis, noticing that all the attention was focused on her sister, disappeared into the toy room and returned in a princess dress.  She promptly hijacked my camera and walked around taking pictures of everyone in the room.  She took this picture of one of the illustrations in the book.
After everyone left, we started preparing for Santa's arrival.  Big Sis hung the magic key on the doorknob to allow Santa to open our door.
The girls worked together in preparing treats for Santa and his reindeer.  Lil Sis had the forethought to include a napkin for Santa to wipe his face.
Next, it was time for Big Sis to write the annual letter to Santa.  She wrote this on her own (she did ask for a bit of help on spelling 2 words).
Santa will most likely write a reply when he stops later.  Who knows which answer he'll be circling.

After their bath, they put on their new pajamas (another Christmas Eve tradition) and held their favorite presents they received tonight.  While the girls were in the tub, I finally figured out how Barbie Mariposa's wings work.  I couldn't understand the directions, so I went on-line to read the reviews on amazon.  One of the reviews made it quite clear and I was very excited when I got it to work.

Sometimes Christmas toys are very frustrating until you figure out how they work.  Sometimes they don't seem to work as advertised, which is also a valuable lesson.  Pixos, for instance, will be under the tree.  We hope this will be a good gift, but if not, we'll have another lesson in how marketing and advertising make things look a lot cooler on TV and when kids actually try to use them, it can be very frustrating.  

Not to fear, there are also Legos under the tree.  Legos never fail.  They are awesome!!

Well, it's time to go get to work on the tasks at hand.  We think this may be the last year we have where both children "believe", so we're going all out to provide evidence.  There will be cookies left in the toy oven (tradition), a note on the dry erase board, half eaten cookies and carrots, and outside, there just may be some jingle bells that just happen to come loose and fall off a reindeer in the drive.  That same reindeer or one of his cohorts, just may happen to need to relieve himself on our property and leave behind something smelly.  Don't worry, no animals will actually be harmed in this process.  (I have a friend who raises miniature llamas and he helped out with some of the evidence.)