Yay For Vacation!

I'm now officially on vacation until after the first of the year!! On Friday I was able to get my grades submitted and everything since then has seemed pretty wonderful. Well, there is my house that is still in need of recovery from our crazy week last week. Yesterday I made some dents in dealing with dishes and laundry. And, I'm still working on it today (just a little bit) and more tomorrow. =)

Clara did not get sick over the weekend, thankfully. So, she was able to participate in her school concert for the preschool through fourth graders. It was quite adorable! The preschoolers were the most entertaining part, with one of them bursting into tears as soon as the first song started and another yelling out "I know that one!" when the teacher announced what song was coming next. All the kids dressed up as characters from the nativity. Clara dressed up as an angel. There were lots of girls dressed as angels!

After the Christmas program, Brian participated in a drive through live nativity at our church. He got to be Joseph standing by a donkey with a "pregnant" Mary sitting on the donkey. Last year, the donkey walked along in the parking lot, so when we drove through Clara was disappointed that the donkey wasn't moving. According to Brian, the donkey didn't want to walk, so they just stood in one place. Brian also said that the donkey about bit his fingers off, so he had a little bit of excitement. =)

Since we were out to see the fun live nativity, we drove and found some cool Christmas lights to look at. One house I had read about online was out in the country a bit and the house couldn't be seen from the highway. When we found it, Clara said she "guessed we didn't go on a wild goose chase after all." It was one of those with the lights synchronized to music, so the girls enjoyed it and said we should take Daddy, and Ryan, and Grandma, and Grandpa. Ryan is one of Brian's friends from college who lives up the street and comes over for dinner sometimes. Evidently he ranks pretty high in the girls' minds.

Yesterday afternoon Clara and I enjoyed a Christmas experience by attending the Nutcracker at the Lied Center. It had been forever since I had been to the Lied Center, so it was fun to go again. It was the first time for both of us to see the Nutcracker and it was a really nice production. Clara enjoyed the first half a lot...with the naughty little boys running around with swords and then the little mice. She like all of the scene changes, too. The second half didn't have quite as much excitement for her...she wanted to know when the boys were coming back and when it would be time to switch from the palace scene to something else. =) There was scene with some gymnastics that she got excited about since she goes to a gymnastics class. All in all, we had a fun time and though we won't be going every year, I would go again in the future.

I'm thankful for fun memories and time at home and vacation!!