Photo Roundup

What we've been up to lately:

Claire is now a full-fledged crawler.  Sometimes she tries to stand up, but it's usually an unintentional bid at two-legged transportation.

Claire's first attempt at cruising

She's been keeping very busy, exploring every possible inch of our home. She found the dog food very quickly, so we hid it from her (not from the dogs, obviously). Today she found it again. The squeals she made as she crawled toward the bowl sounded like pure joy.  She's also working to excavate each and every shelf in her room.  No corner left behind, folks!

See how there's a Claire-sized space? She made that.

All this exploring has her getting plenty of wiggles out.  She's not nearly as cuddly as she used to be, but she still takes time out of her busy day to snuggle with Daddy.

This was on a Sunday.  She doesn't usually sleep in her bows.
I'm not that kind of mom!

In other news, our ward is really into costume parties. We had a Book of Mormon party for primary and then a Nauvoo-themed ward Christmas party all in the same week! Tadaa:

"Book of Mormon stories that my teacher tells to meeee..."

Dressed up as a pioneer to read aloud to the children.
Claire is sporting the bonnet Grandma Judy made her!

Claire met Santa at the party.  At first she was all smiles and giggles.

Claire's first Santa encounter.  It went well until she noticed him.

Then she unwittingly began to play with his white curls. She turned and saw a giant stranger with a beard the likes of which she'd never seen!  Intimidating, to say the least.

Claire's lightbulb moment.

For our most recent Christmas adventure we left Claire with a sitter and trekked over to Redlands University for their Feast of Lights. It was amazing.  Feast of Lights is exactly what Christmas worship services strive to be.  It featured a full orchestra, opera singers, multiple choirs, and a three nativity tableaus. Wow! Joe won the tickets through his employer, but I think we'll plan on going every year.  It really put us in the Christmas spirit!

Lights lining the walk to the chapel and nativity

The live nativity after the show.  The costumes were incredible!