Badnji dan (Christmas Eve)

Aminah and I had a somewhat relaxed morning. I had a nice chat with my Aunt Diane on the phone, who lives in New York. We did dishes, organized the craft area a little, and then played with her animal and people figures. Everyone didn't die today like yesterday. But they napped. And they took turns doing dishes and when the animals wanted to play, the people had to then cook breakfast. Oh, and I washing-machine-felted some of the crocheted trees I made for her winter wonderland. They turned out great. (In the images I post here, you can still see their stitches, but in real life, they barely show up. There is so much felting and fuzz around the stitches, that you don't seem them. Basically, they look better in real life than in these pictures.)




I made plans with my mom for us to get together today to go buy socks. Aminah and I lunched. I had leftover Moroccan stew, and Aminah had peas with butter, and a cheese stick. Before she got here, I set up the winter wonderland and Aminah calls it the "Alice in Wonderland" and put an Alice in it. That's the only "wonderland" reference she has.

(Aminah's wearing the "Little Red Robin Hood" sweater I mentioned earlier from my aunt. (No, it's not red, she just calls it that.) I'm so excited that she'll wear the hood on cold days like today!)





Here's one that I just thought was adorable, even though it's not the wonderland so much, just a girl excited:



Nana came by and then we got bundled up and headed out to the mall. Today is Serbian Christmas Eve. So Nana wanted to get Aminah some Christmas presents, which makes sense. Socks, a raincoat, warm boots, and some warm pants. Of course, they also sell toys at the mall, right next to the pants (how logical, right????). But after all it's Christmas, so even though her grinchy Mama was trying to prevent a toy from being bought, I realized that it makes sense to celebrate Christmas with gift giving, and maybe Aminah isn't as excited about the socks (Smart Wool!) and boots and clothes as I was, and when you follow more than one calendar, it just makes for extra celebrating. (How's that for a run-on sentence!)

We ate a nice (unexpected) early dinner together also, just the three of us, at the mall. It was quiet and the food was good. The drive home was beautiful, because we passed by a lot of lit up yards still decorated with festive lights. Time with Papa was late tonight, as he ate a late dinner after we all got home later than usual. Playing in bed, reading and snuggles before bed.