Setting up the tree

I'm sure this is the first of many Christmas posts to follow. Juniper really enjoyed helping Aaron tighten the screws on the Christmas tree stand.

Visit from Aunt Ann & Uncle Keith

Despite the fact that we don't live near any of Aaron's family, Juniper will get to see lots of Brooks/Dill relatives this holiday season. Last weekend her great-aunt Ann and -uncle Keith spent a night at our house on their way from Texas to Maryland. We all enjoyed the visit, and Juniper was particularly smitten with Ann.



Ann let Juniper play with all of her toiletries and try on her very cool sunglasses.


Juniper enjoyed getting to play with Ann and Keith's two dogs. Most of the dogs in Juniper's life are much bigger than she is; the little dogs were obviously a treat. "I softin' it. I bein' gentle." She was, indeed, very soft and very gentle.

Mmmnh...

Juniper has discovered the joy of the mixing beaters. At this point it's just whipped cream; the fear of toddler salmonella means that Sally has at least a few more years of not having to share the cookie dough.

Note the shirt necklace. Juniper has solidly entered the stage of "wanna do it by mysef." She was on the verge of being sad that she couldn't put a small stretchy shirt on over her thick and puffy fleece, but we managed to turn it into an exciting shirt necklace and distract her from the sadness.

Rainy Day Violet

Where did this big girl come from, and what did she do with our baby Violet? She's a wonderful big girl, and we love her dearly, but we don't understand how it happened so fast.

Jorge the Vampire Robot

One of the fun things about being an aunt and an uncle is getting to introduce our nephew and nieces to things like cardboard box robots. The vampire part, though, that's all Jorge.

Thanksgiving, part 3

This is the last one, we promise! Is it obvious how much we enjoyed having Juniper as an active participant in our Thanksgiving holiday?

Happy Thanksgiving from Sally Honeycutt on Vimeo.

Thanksgiving, part 2

The day before Thanksgiving, Violet and Juniper helped measure out and mix the dry ingredients for pie crusts. Thanksgiving morning, Sally, Aaron, and Juniper made apple pie.



Flour everywhere!



Violet studiously and seriously moved the flour mix back and forth between cup and bowl for about half an hour. Kayla helped to clean up everything that Violet spilled.



Juniper was a good mixer, when she didn't get distracted by her desire to eat the flour-sugar-salt mixture.



Rolling out the dough. (Thanks, Sunanda and Richa for the chapati roller, which doubles nicely as a child-size rolling pin!)



Juniper enjoys her first Thanksgiving dinner. (Yeah, she was here for Thanksgiving last year, but she didn't eat any of the food and certainly didn't have any awareness of what was going on.)