Christmas Magic

We celebrate full blown Christmas in this household, because we do with the feeling this is her last Christmas believing Santa and all what entails. This Christmas, we visited Santa and played with snow . 

We went to Christmas parties with Santa.

 

 

 We went to a Christmas shop to shop for ornaments. 

Decorated her very own tree for the first time: 

And even  went on Polar Express ride to North Pole. 

 

 

 

 

 

However, one item has always be amiss throughout the years, the Elf on the Shelf. I have always thought it  was part of the very  commercial American Christmas in which kids get to have a list of presents, not only one and the more add-ons we would have, the less we think about the real meaning of Christmas. For this reason, I never contemplated having an elf.

 

This year it was hard to resist having one when there was an Elf on the Shelf on her class and all the kids had an Elf but her. I finally gave in…

And the magic happened!

And that's was the best thing that happened so far this Christmas. She was talking to Ginger telling her that she wanted to make a request for Santa. 

The request was for Ginger to go to a poor kid and to "give her place" for Santa to a poor kid next year so that she would not receive her gift next year. I did not see that coming. And I all of the sudden I was tearing up for her innocence and her giving spirit. 

She named her Elf Ginger, which was the name she proposed at school but they chose another name instead based on voting.

 

It was rewarding to see how excited she got as Ginger got naughtier and naughtier. Ginger hung upside down, wrote with lipstick, reminded her about homework and did may other crazy things.

 

To top up, Ginger she flew to Cayman with us where we spent our Christmas in spite of me telling her Ginger would stay behind. Thanks to her Dad who convinced me otherwise.

 

Ginger brought so much joy to our family and inspired us all to be kinder and do the right things. She really did bring out the Christmas spirit in all of us. So much so that the last day with Ginger was bittersweet. We miss her  and we can’t wait to see her again next Christmas.

 

And so this is Christmas… Magical, special as it should be.

 

Easter

Miss B is eight and I know it won't be too long before she stops believing in Easter Bunny and the likes. 

For this reason, I celebrated last Christmas as if it was our last and although I did not have any grand plans for Easter, this Easter turned out to be a very special one. 

We were given the opportunity and could take Hoppers home for the Easter weekend. Hoppers is the bunny girl that belongs to her Math teacher's class: Ms. Slay. I could not believe our luck when she offered Hoppers especially for this weekend. 

B had lots of fun with Hoppers. She got to hug, kiss and laugh at her crazy stunts and Hoppers got to like us too. 

However, nothing was as special as hearing her tell me full of glee all about the Easter Bunny this morning: "Mamaya, the Easter Bunny has been here the entire time. It's Hoppers!"