Christmas time!

As seems to happen every year, suddenly it's December and Christmas is just a few weeks away. I absolutely love this time of year, really from October until about March when the weather starts to warm up again. I love the cold, I love winter clothes, I love cozy houses and fires in the fireplace, and hot chocolate and snow.
We put up our tree and decorations Tuesday and it was by far the best time doing that since we have had kids. Really not stressful, and only 1 ornament casualty. We listened to Christmas music (Sufjan Stevens Holiday and Sara Groves Holiday on Pandora are awesome) and had popcorn and hot chocolate. Eli and Micah especially were so excited to decorate, and super excited for their "activity." All morning as I was bringing up Christmas bins to decorate that night, they kept talking about this "activity." I could not figure out what activity I had promised to do with them, until finally I realized they meant their nativity. My mom gave them the Little People nativity when they were just babies and it is the most loved Christmas decoration we have. It stays packed away until we decorate for Christmas, and it is just so special to them.
They also love their stockings and this year I hung up Hope's stocking. She obviously won't be with us physically this year, but she is constantly on our minds, and it is such a blessing to know her little face.
On another note, suddenly the boys act like they believe in Santa Claus. We made the decision not to make a big deal out of Santa, neither one of us grew up believing in him, so last year we told them he wasn't real. Either they forgot, or never heard us or something, because they have already drawn him like 20 pictures and have plans for letters and cookies for him. And now I don't have the heart to remind them he isn't real! This is exactly what I was trying to avoid. Whatever, I tried, they just better not blame me when their little hearts are broken after they really hear the truth. :)