Baker Family Fun

The night before we left to go out of town for Christmas we got Chinese food for dinner.  Brett's fortune read:

And ya know what? It was completely accurate! We had quite an enjoyable trip. 

Living in southern Texas means there is no way around the fact that travel will take all day.  Unfortunately, our 9 hour travel day turned into 13 due to a fog delay in the Denver airport.  Brooke (and her parents) actually handled the delay quite well.  We ran around the airport, climbed up stairs and made some new friends.  The benefit of such a long delay was that our once full flight was now half empty.  We had plenty of space and that helped lots. She melted down eventually (about 30 minutes outside of Baker City) but what can you expect from a 15 month old who refuses to nap while out and about.  Not even a little cat nap in her carseat...silly girl.

 Stickers!

Once in Baker the real fun began.  Brooke's cousin, Tanner (age 3), was there for the first half of our stay and she adored having someone else her size around.  They had their good moments and not so good moments (read: Brooke is a bully) but it was good practice for Brooke.  It made me worried about how she will treat kids in Nursery next month, so we are practicing a few things in the meantime. Spoiler alert: I don't think it is helping. 

Playing in the table fort

Hugs!

Brooke seemed to adore her Aunt Haili and cuddled with her more than she ever does with me.  Partially because Haili is awesome and partially because she could tell it bothered Tanner. 

 She pushed Tanner right off his mother's lap so she could get in on the cuddles.  

Brooke met someone else her size while in Baker....Sophie the dog! She was only really around Sophie during the Christmas Eve dinner but she was pretty interested in her!

We also got to spend time with:

Uncle Tyler

 Uncle Dekker

Auntie Vel and Uncle Ev

Great Grandma and Grandpa Smith

And of course lots of fun and play time with... Grandma and Papa!

It was so good to have that whole side of the family together.  The Smith boys hadn't been together for a Christmas in 6 years!

Holiday Traditions: Tomball style

Before leaving town for the holidays we made sure to have some fun around here.  Although we were pretty busy with normal life, we tried to do a variety of christmasy things to force us to slow down and  enjoy the holiday season.  It can be hard when the weather is still sunny and warm to realize that it is, in fact, December. But the mild weather allowed for many outdoor activities and some new holiday traditions were born! Brooke especially loved all the twinkling lights we saw and hated with a burning passion all of the real life Santas we saw.  All in all, a success!

Sorry most of the pictures are blurry.  Camera phones and Christmas lights apparently don't mix well. 

We went christmas shopping at the mall and then walked thru Santa's wonderland outside.  There was a giant tree and lots of light up characters.

Ward Christmas Party.  The ward decided to take family pictures for our ward website that night, so this picture is now the new face of the Smith family. It was not an ugly Christmas sweater event, but Brett pulled his out to the joy and amusement of all involved! 

Santa: take one. At the ward Christmas party 

Santa: take two. At the Tomball Christmas festival.   I let her walk to see if she would feel more comfortable.  Nope.  Stop, drop, and become a rock.  Well-played Brooke. 

Santa: take three.  At the German festival. This one, although not your typical Santa, still bore enough resemblance that Brooke cowered in fear of the old man with the beard. 

Strangely enough she still LOVED all things fake Santa.  Her stuffed Santa toy, her Santa books, even large pictures of Santa on buildings.  As long as they weren't alive, she would "ho-ho-ho" happily all day long.

While at the Christmas festival in town we went to the kiddy area and Brooke loved watching the animals.  She kept her distance at first but eventually warmed up.  Until one mischievous little goat decided to jump up and lick her face.  No tears, but we had to back away again.  

 The neighborhoods of all neighborhoods. I looked online to see if I could find a good neighborhood to drive around and see Christmas lights. And I found it! Only 10 minutes away is a HUGE neighborhood that is FULL of lights.  They have competitions and awards and endless streets of magical lights.  I was worried Brooke would get bored and wasn't sure how much she would be able to see but based on the number of times she scream  "oo ooo ohhh!!" and "ho ho ho" (her word for anything Christmas related) I am guessing she loved it.  This one definitely made it on to our holiday traditions list.

We also ventured downtown to see Zoo Lights at the Houston zoo.  It is after hours, so there aren't many animals out but we got lucky and saw the elephants right at the beginning.  At that point, making an elephant noise was one of Brooke's newest tricks so that was fun to show her a live one.