Holiday pix, Part 1: Princeton to Chapel Hill

Christmas 2006

The first present to arrive at our house was a snazzy spinning lightstick, for Edith from her cross-continental buddy Soren. Soren's mother promised the lightstick would provide whole minutes of backseat entertainment on roadtrips, and she was right!

Santa Claus arrived a bit early in Princeton one afternoon during Edith's nap, leaving a bouncy horse and a few other odds and ends.

We then traveled south to Chapel Hill, and as in The Nutcracker, the Christmas tree grew...

Like two generations before her, Edith loved playing with the creche she found under this tree, leaning into the now-somewhat-rickety manger to kiss the baby Jesus, rather than, like some of her relatives past, acting out an alternative Christmas story in which said baby is actually discovered by Herod and burned alive in hot oil.

On Christmas Eve we told Edith she had to be generous enough to leave some milk and cookies for Santa Claus. Several days earlier she had received a magnetic "dooduh pod" (doodle pad) from her Aunt Susan, on which she loves trying to write the letter S. We told her that an S would be a good thing to leave Santa by way of a note, and she came up with one of her clearer attempts.

The youngest member of the family hung her stocking seventh in the row after Moo-maw, Mor-mor, Mommy, Daddy, PeeWee, and Biz. Why no, I never have thought of us as hillbillies before.

On Christmas morning, Edith showed us all what Santa had brought overnight.

Not over-awed for long, she got down to business.

Some gifts demanded immediate use. Like these crayons: Santa, in his infinite wisdom, gave Edith crayons that are good for writing on windows. We know he was thinking of our large French doors. We just hope she quickly learns to distinguish between window crayons and other crayons, lest Edith, like her cousin Maggie, who embellished her bedroom walls during a recent naptime, make "a bad choice."

Edith received a number of tools for helping around the house, including a supply of child-sized kitchen utensils (should we be worried that her favorite was the meat cleaver, which she wielded with abandon for much of the morning?). But before delving into haute cuisine, she took time to study Mommy's copy of Peter Singer's new book on ethical food choices.

We weren't sure she would know what to do with this household tool, since she hasn't, uhm, seen anyone iron terribly often. But it was a hit nevertheless.

Despite Mom's greater enthusiasm for this endeavor, she has demonstrated yoga just about as often as ironing since Edith was born. But Edith didn't need instruction--she looked at the cover of this reference guide Mom received and jumped right in:

Merry Christmas!