It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...

Here is a peek into our Christmas season so far :)

For years I have searched for an advent calendar that I liked but this year I gave up and just made my own.  I filled it will little scrolls and on those scrolls is an activity for the family.  On days that I don't have an activity to do I let Ava pick from a bag of small $1 crafts from Michaels.  I wrapped each one in brown paper and wrote a number on them that correspond with the number on the scroll.  It took her a few days to figure it out but now she enjoys opening each day's scroll.

 On December 1st Ava found a package on the front porch.

 It was from Santa...her very own Elf on the shelf...a new tradition has started.  More Harold (that's what she named him) pictures will come.  They are mostly on my phone.

 We typically get a real tree but this year I thought it would be fun to go cut one down.

 We got a smaller one than years past because this year we have added trains to the bottom and we weren't sure how much clearance or room we would have.

 Back to the advent calendar...after each day we get to flip the boxes over and a little scene is underneath.

 After a few days...

 One of Ava's crafts

 I plan to go around next week and take better pictures of all of the Christmas lights.

 Here is a Harold picture that I took with my camera for a contest. 

This week I got some pretty good photos of Ava for our Christmas cards.  She totally wasn't in the mood but I got some cute ones anyways.

 

 This was today...she never naps but she did today and it was so cute I had to get pictures.

 Here is the advent calendar as of today...see all the little scenes :)

Now let me see what I can pull off of my phone.

 

 Ava's little tree that she got to decorate herself.

 Going to a victorian Christmas party at Dr. Mudds house...Harold got to come too.

 

 We made salt dough ornaments.  I don't think I took a picture of them painted.

 Ava made cookies

  I made Ava a large felt tree that she can decorate as many times as she wants.  The trunk has a pocket to hold all of the ornaments.

 More of Ava's baking

 and even more.

 I made a mini tree as part of a gift

 Recently Ava watched the videos from last Christmas and saw her cat from Santa.  She decided she was scared of it not long after Christmas so it's been just sitting in her room.  She totally forgot about it and said she wanted that for Christmas this year.  Well today there I was cleaning the room and moving the cat into the closet so she didn't see it and she walked in.  So I just gave her the Christmas cat.

I have more pictures from our baking and from a trip to see lights.  Plus we are going to see more this weekend...including the ones downtown :)  So once I get that all edited I will get it posted.