Last night I was wondering to myself why the first couple of days of this week were so hard and then I put two and two together. Last week my Mom was here. I had to elbow my way to the dishwasher if I wanted to even think about loading or unloading it. Same goes with washing bottles. My Mom was such a help. She tended to the children, tidied our messes and took care of us. Best part of it all was she loved us all week long. No wonder it looks like a bomb went off in my house this week! On one of the days she was here, we headed out to Santa Cruz to enjoy the beach. Holly is in love with the ocean, although sometimes I cringe when she says, "beach." Her pronounciation isn't the clearest. Anyways, it was a beautiful December day!

These little things are our touches of Christmas (besides the tree of course). Nice and simple. We could use a little more, but I like the idea of accumulating year by year. I think I'll spray paint our nativity figurines glossy white, either before I put them away or next year. I had grander plans for this year, but alas, I have two little children and I can't do it all. And that's okay. In the meantime, this is our little Christmas!

It's no secret that I love matryoshka dolls. I seriously love them. This year's ornaments for the girls are handmade felt matryoshka dolls with embroidery. They turned out darling! I feel like each one clearly represents the child it belongs to. It took a little while to make them, but it was worth it. Holly loves playing with hers! I'd like to make some for Conor and I, but that's being thrown onto next year's pile. Whew, next year's pile is becoming huge!

Tutorial here.

I love crawling babies! Greta's especially adorable because she snorts.