Astrid's 1st Christmas

Today is the baby's first Christmas. Here is Astrid with her first present.

With our house being for sale and all of the viewings, inspections, etc. it wasn't a good time to get a tree. I don't feel too bad about it since Astrid is too young to appreciate a tree anyway.

I want to thank everyone who sent gifts for Astrid. That was very sweet of you. Thank you for thinking of her!

Here she is wearing the winter hat and playing with the burlap bag with baby toiletries that she got from her Godmother Jill.Here she looks puzzled as if she's asking, "Are you serious? I can tear this paper to bits and pieces and it's okay with you? Really?"

Here she's starting to get the hang of it. She liked playing with the tissue paper. We had to keep a watchful eye on her to make sure she didn't put any of it in her mouth.


The pic on the left is Astrid with a collection of CD's called, "Tunes of Toddlers." It has songs, rhymes, and stories. She also got another CD which is called, "ABC's and 1, 2, 3's."

The pic on the right is Astrid trying to chew on her gift bag.

If you look closely you can see a baby in the midst of all the Christmas carnage. You can also see Uwe's reflection in the TV.Here we are, mother and daughter. Astrid is happily playing with her snowman.Uwe with Astrid on his lap. Astrid loves tags and here she is holding the tag attached to her snowman.After opening presents Astrid was ready for her nap. Uwe and I snuggled up on the couch with good books and read for an hour or so. He's wearing his robe that I got him for Christmas and he looked so content curled up on the end of the couch reading that I wanted to get a photo of him. But as soon as he heard the camera turn on he started making funny faces and cracking up. Finally I got this pic of him smiling and reading.I had Astrid on her changing table to change her into her Christmas outfit. Her radar honed right in on the baby wipes.She was so determined to get that package of baby wipes that I let her go for it.
Here she is happy to be holding the baby wipes close to her.Astrid in her Christmas long johns.

She still has a cold with a runny nose and is a little fussier than usual so Uwe carried her around in the Baby Bjoern for an hour. I was trying to get Astrid to look at Uwe (taking the photo) and so I must have been saying something when Uwe took this photo. The cute thing about it is that we both have our mouths open in the same shape like we're saying the same thing at the same time.

We had our friend Dave over and we shared a nice Christmas dinner together. Uwe cooked an 18 lbs organic turkey and I made the side dishes (stuffing, squash with apples, and a sweet potato casserole with pecans).

Uwe decorated the house with candles, so even though we didn't have a Christmas tree this year, it still felt very warm and inviting in our home and all of the lights made it feel like Christmas.Rose and Uwe sitting in a tree
K- I- S- S- I- N- G
First come loves
Then comes marriage
Then comes a baby in a baby carriageHere the 3 of us are celebrating our first Christmas together (and the baby's first Christmas).