The week before Christmas

Avonlea Jane's room has all of our snowmen decorations, and it has taken a while for her to understand that they should remain in her room.

Above, Avonlea Jane is getting ready to go meet Baby Jack, the new baby of our friends Megan and Geoff. When we got to their house, she was quite taken with the baby, so much so that she cried the whole way home, "Baby Dack! Baby Dack!" Then, when we pulled into our driveway, that changed to, "Want baby brother! Want baby brother!"

On Saturday afternoon, many of Salem's residents set to the sidewalks to pay their respects to fallen Army Sgt James Anthony Ayube II, a combat medic and the first Salem casualty in the Iraq/Afghanistan conflict.

Above, Avonlea Jane is standing with our neighbor Mark as we prepare to walk to where the funeral procession will cross through North Salem. (photo credit: Karen Smith, patch.com)

(photo credit: Karen Smith, patch.com)

The flag displayed by the fire department over the North River Bridge (photo credit: Karen Smith, patch.com)

Saturday evening, we hosted our game group's holiday party at our house and welcomed almost thirty guests. Despite the tight quarters, everyone had a wonderful time, especially Avonlea Jane. She was thrilled to get to wear her "Mawmaw party dress," a Christmas dress she got for her birthday from Mawmaw. We didn't happen to take any pictures of the party, but we'll make sure to get photos of her dolled up for Christmas Eve.

Because of the cold weather and it being the final days of Mommy's pregnancy, we've not been walking downtown for play dates or story times. Avonlea Jane hasn't exactly been thrilled with this hermit status, and every morning she wakes up reciting a list of which friends she hopes she'll see that day.

Yesterday, we finally made it to a play date a little over half a mile away. This date was particularly special, because I let Avonlea Jane walk there herself (along with her friend Violet) as opposed to riding in the stroller. While she had a good time knocking the snow of every fence post she passed, picking some up every five feet, and running for every pile, calling: "make snowman!" it might have been more efficient to teach the cats how to pull us in a sled to get there.

Just starting our walk

Avonlea Jane, Violet, and Justin playing with bubbles

Catching bubbles while wearing Mr. Potato Head's glasses

After walking so much, she was very eager to go to bed at night. When we went in to check on her before we went to sleep, we found that she had gotten out of bed, gotten her Santa hat, and climbed back in.

Not only is this a great example of our little elf's holiday spirit but her love of sleeping horizontally. This is also a very light "more animals" night. She is sleeping with only Teddy, an elephant puppet, and "Pink;" ordinarily, you can barely make her out within the menagerie.