25 days of cadnis + twins

day 24: christmas eve

day 24!!! one more day aaaaah.

the twins are three here!

enjoy!!

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"Girls! Come here!" Janis calls from the kitchen. She grins as her twins come bouncing down the hallway to find her, followed by Cady.

"Hi Mommy!" Leo says eagerly.

"Hi, Bumblebee," Janis chuckles. "What were you doing?"

"Wrapping p'esents!" Layla cheers. "For you!"

"Oh, really?" Janis hums. "I can't wait to open them. Come here."

"What are you doin'?" Leo asks curiously as she's lifted to the counter. Janis lifts Layla too and sits them next to each other, before handing them some small bricks of clay they had picked out at the craft store a few days ago.

"We're gonna make your handprints!"

"Handprint?"

"Mmhmm," Janis replies, helping take the plastic off of the clay bricks. Leo picked a baby pink, and Layla chose a dark green. They both start squishing the clay around once they have it back. "We've made your handprints like this every year since you were born, do you remember?"

They both think about it for a minute. Cady pulls the old ones out of their carefully cushioned box and brings them over so they can see.

"These are from your first Christmas," she says, giving them the smallest ones. "Look how little your hands were!"

They both take and carefully look at the little discs with their tiny handprints in the middle, holding up their larger three-year-old hands to compare.

"We was babies?" Leo asks.

"Yeah, you were just babies," Cady chuckles. "My tiny little cubs. And then this was the next year, see how much bigger your hands got?" They both look curiously at the difference between their first and second Christmas handprints. "And we made these last year!"

"Oh yeah!" Layla says. "Last yeaw."

"How much have your hands grown?" Cady asks, holding up little hands to the most recent ones. Fingers are a few centimeters longer, palms even more chubby. "Look how much bigger! You two are growing so fast!"

They both giggle as Cady tickles their tummies. Janis takes their clay bricks and starts massaging the firm blocks to get it more pliable.

"Like cookie dough," Leo says, looking curiously at the pink blob in Janis' hands. Janis laughs and nods.

"It is kind of like cookie dough. But it's not very yummy," she replies. "Can you get me the rolling pin, please?"

Layla scoots her way across the counter to the utensils, and grabs the requested rolling pin. "Here, Mommy."

"Thank you Ladybug," Janis chuckles. Cady pulls them closer to her and hugs them while they watch Janis roll the pink clay ball flat into a disc.

"Okay, Bee, come here," Janis coaxes. Leo heads over and holds up her hands. "Good job. We do your right hand every year, this one." Leo puts her left hand down and leaves her right one up with spread fingers. "There we go. Ready?"

Leo nods, so Janis carefully positions her little hand over the disc and pushes down. Leo helps as best as she can, pushing down with as much force as her three year old arms can muster. Janis helps by squishing her little fingers and palm in to make sure they get all the details. "Owie."

"Sorry, Bee. We have to push hard to make sure we get all your fingers in there," Janis replies. "Should we see how it came out?"

Leo nods, so Janis takes her wrist and pulls her hand back up. Leo smiles when she sees the perfect imprint of her hand in the clay. "My hand!"