Merry Christmas! (by the AG Gossip Dolls)

 Merry Christmas! We are having such a fantastic Christmas here at AG Gossip. We are having lots of fun opening presents and spending time together. We have some pictures to share with you. We are so lucky to have so many supportive readers. Thank you so much, it really means a lot to us. We hope you all are having a happy holiday season! Merry Christmas from the AG Gossip family!

Setting out milk and cookies for Santa. Yum!

Santa came! What's in my stocking?

We are lucky to recieve so many wonderful gifts. Boy, we made a mess!

Last Minute 'Till Christmas (by Molly)

Christmas is tomorrow! All of the dolls have been filling every last minute with Christmas preparations and holiday fun. One of the most common activities we have been doing is wrapping presents. We've all been taking turns wrapping gifts in the living room. It's a mess! The room is covered in tape, paper, bows, and ribbon! Kit rushes to the tree every time someone finishes wrapping a gift to see if it's for her. Angela has to make constant trips to the store, since we have been running out of supplies so fast. Wrapping gifts seems like such an easy task, but it is quite a challenge for me. No matter what I do, I always make a mistake. I consistently cut pieces of paper too big or too small for the present. One time the tape got stuck to my fingers and ended up sticking to everything! I should ask Josefina to give me some tips, she has mastered the art of wrapping. After wrapping gifts, I always go to the kitchen to relax. It is always filled with warm, delicious smells and holiday sweets. Today, Nicki was decorating a gingerbread house. I helped her ice the roof. She really worked hard to place each piece of candy to make sure it looked perfect. It would be such a shame to eat it! Luckily, Carely made gingerbread cookies for us to snack on. Within minutes the cookies were gone. "Oh no!" cried Carely, "We needed to leave some for Santa!" Oops! I guess I should go help make some cookies for Santa. Bye!

O Christmas Tree (by Julie)

    Hey, Julie here! I am so excited about Christmas. I think that it is such a great holiday. To me, it never really feels like Christmas until we put up our tree. So, I'm going to tell you the story behind our tree. Normally, we put up an artificial tree, but this year we decided to change it up and get a real, live tree! We sent Samantha and Nicki to buy a tree. While they were gone, the rest of us went into the attic to get our Christmas ornaments and decorations. Everyone carried a box or two downstairs. We found that some boxes had gathered quite a bit of dust. The worst part was when a cockroach crawled out of a box! Eww! We all screamed and jumped on the couch or on a chair whlile Jessica bravely squished the roach with her shoe. What seemed like a simple task had turned into quite the adventure! Around noon, Samantha and Nicki had returned. "We found the perfect tree!" Samantha boasted. We eargerly waited to see the tree. "Ta da!" Nicki and Samantha said as they presented the tree to us. However, we were not as thrilled with the tree as they were. "What is this? Out of all thee trees in the lot, this is the one you buy?!" Felicity screeched. The tree was really small and had almost no branches. Let's face it, it was pathetic. "But it is soooo cute!" said Samantha. I have to admit is was pretty cute. So, we decided to give the little tree a chance. We tried decorating it but it barely could hold the weight of one ormanent! We all sighed as we unpacked the artificial tree. Even though it isn't real, our tree still looks beautiful. Besides, we had lots of fun decorating it. So now  two very different trees brighten our home with Christmas spirit! 

Visiting Santa (by Kaya)

 Today, all of the AG Gossip dolls were at the mall doing some Christmas shopping. After a couple of hours, we decided to take a break and go visit Santa. We all got in the end of the long line and started our wait. We played games to make the time pass more quickly. When we finally made it to the front of the line, Kit immediately volunteered to go first. Her list was surprisingly short. It was only 2 pages! Marisol was up next.When she sat on Santa's lap, she unrolled a LONG list that went all the way to the floor! "I just couldn't make up my mind!" Marisol explained. Things went more smoothly after that. For the most part, we all asked for a few things and left. Our luck ended when it was Josefina's turn. She reached into her pocket and pulled out a short list. "I would like eggs, milk, bananas, peanut butter...oh no!" Her face turned red as she realized, "This is the grocery list!" So instead, Josefina asked for one of the many items from Marisol's list. Jessica had patiently waited and was ready to be the last to go. She cheerfully sat on Santa's lap and cleared her throat. I guess she had a tickle in her throat because she started coughing. When she caught her breath, Jessica gasped. We all noticed a bright pink spot on Santa's beard. Jessica's gum had accidentally fallen out of her mouth and onto Santa's beard! "I'm so sorry!" Jessica exclaimed. An elf had to go get scissors and trim off the hair with gum in it. After that was settled, we gathered for a group photo with Santa, and continued shopping. I hope we all get what we want for Christmas! What do you want to receive for Christmas?

Happy Hanukkah! (by Marisol)

Yesterday was the last night of Hanukkah! We had a blast celebrating the eight day festival of lights. Rebecca organized all of the festivities. On the first night of Hanukkah, we each got a beautifully wrapped gift. When we opened them we each found a Menorah, which is a candle holder that holds eight candles plus one extra called the Shamus. We also got colorful candles to light! Carely put her cooking skills to use by making golden, crispy latkes (potato pancakes)! Yummy! One night, Julie put a huge glob of sour cream on her latkes. When she took a bite, she quickly spit it into a napkin. "That wasn't whipped cream!" she exclaimed. We also had a ton of dreidel games during the course of the holiday. So many that we ran out of gelt (chocolate coins)! I admit, it's hard not to snack on your gelt during the game! It's a good thing we found a bag of peanuts in Kit's messy room! My favorite part of Hanukkah has always been lighting the Menorah. This year we tried to help Molly get over her fear of burning herself with the candles. She still worries about dropping a candle and setting the house on fire, but she has improved! There is something really beautiful about 15 Menorahs all lit. Yesterday, I stared in awe at the sight of 135 flames dancing joyously together. Happy Hanukkah!

A Great Turkey Day (by Carely)

We hope that everyone had a great Thanksgiving. We sure did! To start off, I will announce the results of our canned food drive. The winning team had both the most items and the most fans' votes. The winning team is... drum roll please... TEAM 2! Team 2 had a total of 73 items. Team 1 had a total of 68 items. so altogether we collected 141 items! When we donated our items to our local food bank, the people there were so happy. It felt good to know that we had made a difference. On the day before Thanksgiving, we went to see Molly, Kirsten, and Nicki perform in their Thanksgiving play. It told the story of the first Thanksgiving. The play was cute. After the show, Nicki complained about only having one line: "Gobble, Gobble!" But, all three of them said that they had a fun time! The next morning, everyone was up early to watch the Thanksgiving Day Parade. After that, I took control of the kitchen and started to make the meal with the help of my fellow chefs, Kaya and Kit. Boy, did we make a mess! I felt bad for myself and the rest of Team 1. The counters were covered with pots, pans, and scraps of food. I was not looking forward to cleaning the kitchen. Thanksgiving dinner was delicious! I was flattered by all the compliments my cooking received. After everyone stuffed themselves, Angela, Chrissa, Felicity, Jessica, Josefina, Julie, and I reluctantly trudged into the kitchen. Our arms felt like rubber from all the scrubbing and cleaning. When we finally finished, we were ready to reward our hard work with big slices of pumpkin pie! It didn't take long for us to clean our plates, and for Kit to devour the entire bottle of whipped cream! We have so much to be thankful for and I'm glad we took the time to realize that. Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Cantastic! (by Samantha)

A few days ago, all of the AG Gossip dolls were together talking about the menu for our magnificent Thanksgiving feast, and debating the amount of vegetables we'd have. I wasn't quite as enthusiastic as my friends, for I was feeling rather glum. "What's wrong Samantha?" Josefina asked. I explained that I felt bad for the less fortunate people who didn't have as much to be thankful for. Then, Carely had an idea. "Let's have a canned food drive!" she exclaimed. Everyone agreed that it was a great idea. Jessica was the only one who had any objection. "We should make it a competition!" Once again, we all loved the idea. We divided ourselves into two teams alphabetically. Team 1 is Angela, Carely, Chrissa, Felicity, Jessica, Josefina, and Julie. Team 2 is Kaya, Kirsten, Kit, Marisol, Molly, Nicki, Rebecca, and me. The rules are simple, the team that collects the most cans and other food items will be the winners. The losing team will have to clean up the kitchen after Thanksgiving. We all know that this is a big task, that requires lots of hard work! Of course, things haven't been that simple! Members from each team are asking classmates, friends, and neighbors to donate cans to their team. News about our canned food drive is slowly spreading throughout our whole community. Some of us are taking the competition a little too seriously. One day, Kit sent Molly to spy on the other team! Another day, cans mysteriously started disappearing from our team's pile! Hopefully, everyone will start playing fair again! Even though we all may be a bit competitive, we never forget that we all are working to help others. We want more families to get good Thanksgiving meals. Hey, our contest isn't over yet! You can help increase one of the team's score by commenting "Team 1" or "Team 2" on the chat box or on this post. Be sure about the team you vote for because you can only do it once! We will announce the winning team on our next post. We hope we'll collect lots of cans and get lots of comments from you too!