Getting Ready for Xmas

The weekend before Thanksgiving, we took Wynn to (what we stubbornly continue to refer to as) the Dayton's Holiday display in downtown Minneapolis. This year's theme is "A Day in the Life of an Elf", and Wynn was totally into it. Her favorite character was an elf who'd gotten his head stuck in a box and was blindly twirling in circles. (Her sense of humor is a bit twisted sometimes.) She still mentions him every now and then - and then bursts into fits of laughter.

Having your picture taken with Santa was an option, but we chose to whisk her past that line and go to the table where you could write him a letter instead.

She sat herself down, grabbed a crayon and a postcard, and proceeded to write W-Y-N-N. (Scott and I both got all teary-eyed and blubbery with parental pride at that point.) She didn't know how to write what she wanted to ask for, so she drew a picture instead: a Santa hat (?!) Apparently, she likes his hat and wants one just like it. Go figure!

Thanksgiving was a fun, low-stress event. Wynn loaded up on turkey and stuffing; then she helped her uncle Paul assemble the gingerbread house kit he'd brought. She had a blast, but it's a frosting-lacquered mess ...
She insists that we have to keep it until Christmas, but even Wynn admits that it's not fit for consumption. "We'd get sick," she says, "Too much frosting." When I asked her if we should put it out in the yard for the squirrels, she got all serious and warned, "Oh, no. It make squirrels sick too." So, for now, our kitchen has the overwhelming smell of canned frosting and commercial grade gingerbread lingering in the air, but Wynn beams with pride at the little house and says making it was her favorite part of Thanksgiving.