I went there today...

to my happy place, that is. The land of organization and labels! It's such a wonderful place. Every time I go there it makes me giddy with excitement!

Last night my parents came over and gave their Christmas gifts to our girls, which was mostly toys that now need to find a home in our house. So this afternoon I set to work finding a place for everything, and everything in its place.

This bookcase is currently in Clara's room, but it will move to the living room when we take the Christmas tree down. Toys are sorted....

and bins are labeled. :)

This cubby thing is also in Clara's room. Again, toys are sorted....

and, drumroll please..... the shelves are labeled with fancy labels from my BFF, the labelmaker!

Seriously, looking at these pictures makes me so excited! I'm ready for her to wake up tomorrow and pull out all the toys and make a big mess with them so I can sort them all and put them back in their rightful spot. :)

A Christmas Tradition...frugal style

When I was growing up, one of our traditions was my parents gave each of us a new ornament each Christmas. The idea was that when we became adults and we moved out on our own we'd have some ornaments to start our own tree with. We always eagerly looked forward to finding out what our new ornament would be. Because I loved that tradition so much I wanted us to do that for our girls too.

This year Lola got a "baby's first Christmas" ornament from Hallmark, which I justified splurging on because it's a photo frame ornament and I really like being able to see what my baby looked like on her first Christmas.

However, I couldn't justify splurging on an ornament for Clara because the bucks are tight around here. Plus she's young enough yet to not notice the difference in ornaments, or even to realize that Lola got an ornament. I wanted an Elmo ornament for Clara because when I think of her at two years old, I think of the fact that she really likes Elmo and Sesame Street.

So to get to the point here, I made her an Elmo ornament out of felt. And it actually turned out cuter than I thought it would. And she loves it! I gave it to her this morning and let her put it on the tree.

One Elmo ornament made using supplies we already had on hand... $0!

Bath Time

Lola needed a bath one morning and we've been using the kitchen sink. Of course Clara wanted to be in on the action to help, so it seemed like a good photo opportunity!

What Clara is doing right now...

Advent with a toddler

This year Clara is old enough to start to understand what Christmas is about, so after dinner we've been spending some time with one of her two kid-friendly nativity sets and reading the Christmas story from either our Bible or her toddler Bible. So far it's been a big hit!

This set was Jeremy's when we was a kid. His grandma and grandpa made it.

I love that she wanted to put everyone up on the roof.

And then she lined them all up outside the stable.

She calls the shepherd "leopard."

What about you? What fun things do you like to do with your toddler during the Advent season?