lovely day

there is a hearty, thick layer of snow on the ground. I am glad! i love that snow has arrived, and given the temperatures, it will remain for a while. We're decked our apartment with the warm glow of Christmas decorations. Our tree is up and beautiful. Owen requested purple lights (cousin lillian's fav colour is purple and so he seems to like it a lot right now, too) but we settled with a string of lights that has yellow, green, red and blue. He loves the tree and the ornaments. The first thing he does in the morning is turn the tree lights on. We very well may burn out all the lights on these string of lights cause they are always on!
We had talked that we wanted to go for evening walks to look at the lights but the cold has settled in in true minnesota style and it doesn't seem like a good idea to take Aleida out. And so she stays in while one of us takes Owen out to observe the beauty of winter at night. There are a couple houses a few blocks away from our house that are especially decorated for Christmas. Owen LOVES these houses! The last time he and I walked to look at the lights he sat down on the sidewalk and just wanted to sit there for a while. It was super cute.

I have hopes of baking Christmas cookies soon, and other holiday treats. Baking, to me, is an integral part of the Christmas season. I am excited that Ry and I are forming family traditions and I want to be sure to incorporate certain things within our family tradition. One thing that I want to do is make ginger cookies, shaped and decorated appropriately. Another, which will involve a little digging, is getting a recipe from my Aunt Japke - she always made these fun little mice cookies at Christmas. They were so delicious: the body was a soft chocolate cookies (not baked), the eyes, ears and nose were little candies, and the tail a piece of licorice. I looked forward to eating these cookies. Certainly the kids in my life would like to eat these, too.

We haven't taken any photos lately, but there are some older pics that we haven't posted yet.

Aleida at 5 days old:


a little over 1 week old. Bundled up after a bath:


Aleida at 2 weeks old: