Christmas pics

I know, Christmas break is over and I still haven't put any pictures up.  Here's a few.  We went down to San Antonio for the holiday.  Stephanie was able to take off the whole week between it and New Years, plus had the 23rd and 24th off.  So we stayed down there for 4 or 5 days.  The bad news was that Sophie got sick (again) the day before we went down.  She had a fever and sniffles and coughing, and pretty much couldn't eat anything for a few days.  Hopefully, she didn't get anyone else sick.  We got her on antibiotics right away this time and she's been pretty much back to normal for the last few days.  

Sophie got a bunch of great new toys and other gifts.  This was needed, since her birthday is so close after Christmas that by the time they get here, it's been a long dry spell.  Maybe this year we will actually keep some of them unopened until July, like we talked about doing last year.  I'm still not sure she gets what day Christmas is and doesn't get excited about it before hand, but she's definitely getting the hang of opening presents.  We've been talking up her birthday, though, and she seems to get that idea a little better.  Plus I made a little calendar of this week showing her remaining school days and then Saturday with a cake and hats.  We'll see if she gets the crossing off the days as they go by.  

Anyway, back to Christmas.  The weather down there was nice, and after Sophie got to feeling better, she started enjoying the outside.  The swing is at my Grandma's house.  Who knows how long it's been there?  I swang on it when I was a little kid, and it was old and rusty then!  Still works though.  Stephanie spent at least a half hour pushing.  We're excited that Sophie can sit on big kid swings now, instead of having to be in the baby "bucket" ones.  

One day we went to the Kiddie Park again.  We'd been once before when Sophie was real small.  This time she was pretty frightened of the carousel and didn't want to be there.  She's very sensitive to noises and gets overwhelmed in loud public places easily.  But we walked around and I told her we were just looking around.  We looked at the boat ride, but she didn't like that.  Then we watched some little girls riding the airplane ride, but she was still not interested.  Then we walked by the little car ride and I said there's the cars, and she signed Yes.  I said you want to ride the cars?  And she signed yes again.  So we stood in line and bought a ticket and I asked what color she wanted to ride? (to keep the interest up before she chickened out) and she signed the blue car.  So she got on it with one other little girl and they started it up.  I won't say she was thrilled about it, but she didn't freak out and she waved at us the first 3 or four times around.  After that, I think she was ready to get off, but she did good and waited til the end.    Stephanie, my mom, and I talked it up about how great she did.  And all the rest of the day she kept signing car and horsie.  And now she loves looking at the pictures, so I think we'll have to go every time we're down there and try to get her more used to it.