God bless us, every one!

By Dan, on December 27th, 2010

Indeed, we do feel very blessed! We’ve had a wonderful year watching our little girls grow up, bit by bit; every day they’re exploring and learning new things. We are very thankful that for the most part, they’re very happy little girls — and they bring us great joy as well. Since they’re 1½ now, Carolyn and Elizabeth were able to be much more involved in the festivities this year. They had much fun tearing at the wrapping paper and playing with their new toys.

Some of the highlights so far… They were very amused (at least initially) with a little jack in the box toy, where you turn the little crank to make the song play, until eventually a friendly looking pirate pops up out of the box. They also got a nice fuzzy rocking dog toy that they can ride on — that’s right, a dog, not a horse. They’re not quite big enough yet to climb up without help, but I’m sure it won’t be long. Even before it was fully unwrapped, they instantly responded to it like a giant stuffed animal, pressing their faces against its head and saying “Awwwww…” (Whenever they give hugs to a doll or stuffed animal, they always make that sound, presumably because it’s what they always hear other people say whenever they do something really cute like that.) Each of them also got their own little toy cell phones that flip open, complete with LED screens that light up and lots of beeping buttons that they can push. Since Daddy’s remote controls are off-limits, they’re quite fascinated by these. In fact, they were so intrigued by them that it was difficult to get them put them down in order to open other presents! It probably won’t be long before I want to take the batteries out of them… On the other hand, I guess this gives us some leverage, and now we can threaten to take away their cell phones if they start misbehaving.

Here are some photos: