toddler tushies and gingerbread hovels

This morning we woke to a dusting of snow outside. It seemed like the perfect sort of day for making a gingerbread house. When Celia woke up I was already assembling the house, so it could firm up for decorating later in the day. Pita helped get the decorations ready by putting them in bowls and taking inventory of all the colors and sizes. The organization didn't last long because she discovered how fun it was to combine all the candy and dump it from one container to another, over and over again.

Then Pita had to have a bath. Ever since she became terrified of the bathtub we haven't had many full ones- mostly sponge baths while standing outside the tub. Today I had to wash her hair and did it in the sink. Pita actually really liked it. She liked putting her hands and feet in the water, used a washcloth to wash herself, and liked seeing in the mirror that the shampoo made bubbles on her head. She even giggled away as I rinsed off her hair. So now we've established that she's scared of the bathtub, not actually getting washed.

After the bath, Celia wanted to sit on the potty. First she insisted on sitting on the "big potty" in the bathroom, and when we got downstairs she wanted to sit on her potty too. When she was done she tried pulling her pants up by herself. She got close.

Convinced of her success, she decided to play on the slide,

But something didn't feel quite right.

After we got that straightened out Celia found one of Chris's ties, put it on, and told me she was going to work :).

Later in the morning my parents arrived for the day, and we got going on decorating the house. Celia wasn't that into it. I think she was confused because she figured out (despite my insistence otherwise) that the candy and cookies were, in fact, edible and just wanted to taste everything. Once she figured that out, she had no interest in putting them on the house anymore! The end result certainly looks like it was done by a toddler:

That's about all for today. Pita's napping and it's time to get started on planning a vegan Christmas menu!