Assorted Christmas Mini-Recap

There's so much to get to and I'm going to miss tons of stuff, but here are a few highlights from our trip to NJ for Christmas:

Cody and Cordelia opening the amazing quilts that Granny made for them. They totally freaked out with joy and now sleep under them every night.

Cody and Cordelia with Fiona (and Kelly) on Christmas morning:

C & C helpfully explaining the iPad to Granny.

Here's Emma with her present from Kelly and Mark. It's a pack-and-play bed for her dolls. Except that Emma refuses to allow her dolls to use it. She treats it as a bed for herself.

Funny story: Mark and Kelly also gave Emma some clothes for one of her dolls, Baby Stella. Upon opening them, Emma immediately began struggling to get the doll pants onto herself. Somehow, she succeeded in getting her feet through the leg holes and the pants just over her ankles. I suggested to her that the pants would fit Stella somewhat better. She angrily replied, "No! These are MY pants!"

Here are the three kids playing in the backyard on the one temperate day we had in Parsippany. Note who the alpha is, obviously.

This is probably my favorite series of Emma pictures yet, from the afternoon of her birthday. Totally adorable:

And this is Cody showing off his Precise V-5 Rolling Ball Extra Fine Tip pens to a very interested Aunt Mary Beth:

And here's Mary Beth with her girls. (Note the matching outfits--a first.)

And here's the birthday girl, in a tiara, curled up on Pop-Pop's chair:

Then it was party time!

Unlike last year, she was very into the cupcake:

She was less excited by my birthday present--the first public appearance of Super Girl. Who happens to have short, curly blonde hair and a winning smile. (Not pictured: Emma.)

And finally there's this shot of Cora, which I just love. My favorite pics of the kids are always the ones where their expressions are opaque. Is she about to smile? To cry? To announce that the cupcakes we've all just eaten were laced with strychnine? Who could say.