Visiting with Ho Ho

I took Karlie to visit Ho Ho today. I would have been willing to bet a large sum of money that she was going to be terrified of him this year. I was pretty sure that our picture this year was going to be of Karlie crying and Santa trying to hang on to her long enough for the photo to be taken. When we arrived at Santa's spot in the mall, we were the only ones there. A couple of other moms came up right behind us, so I decided to let them go first, so Karlie could see their kids sitting on Santa's lap. We also had been talking about sitting on his lap for a while now, just to try to prepare her for this. Boy was she prepared! When it was her turn she walked right up to Mr. Claus and held her arms out for him to pick her up. He didn't even get her on his lap before she started talking. I heard her ask for a Pooh Bear, which I can guarantee he will bring her. I am not sure what else she was talking to him about, because I spent most of the time with the photographer trying to get Karlie to quit talking long enough to look at us so the poor lady could snap a photo. We didn't get a smiley picture, but at least her mouth isn't moving in this one!

Karlie also helped me decorate the tree this year. This was a job that she took very seriously. She knew that most of our decorations were breakable, and she was extremely careful with everything. She started out hanging the ornaments on the actual light bulbs. I showed her how to hang them on the branches and she did a great job after that.

She helped out for a while, then all of sudden she needed to eat an orange. So I had to finish the rest of the tree. We will see how many times I have to ask her not to touch it in the next few weeks.