I should start by pointing out that last year there were only
Three Days of Christmas. We just like celebrating so much we drag it out as long as possible. Therefore this post is going to feel about 4 days long. Just warning you.
Christmas Day #1: Saturday at Nana's
When I was getting photos off of my camera and phone I kind of freaked because the only record of our time at Nana's was this priceless one:
Rebecca standing behind the Darth Vader (Star Wars figure case from when Kyle and Luke were little). Before I even realized I did in fact have other photos I came to grips with this being the only one because it really is quite fitting for our year, so why not Christmas at Nana's too. :)
Mel and I (without talking to each other) both opted to get each others' kids one big gift instead of a 3 smaller ones, and both were things for the backyard! Great mommas think alike. If you can't tell by the picture it is a sea saw! (Mel cut the picture on the box up like a puzzle and that was what they got at first.) And the BEST part of the gift is that it came fully assembled and delivered (muchiiiiisimas gracias to Uncle Luke!). Funny story Mel told me about when Luke was putting it together: Blake asked if it was for them and Luke told him no, it was for cousins Owen, Rebecca and Maggie. Trying to make sense of why Luke was putting it together for us he said something along the lines of: Oh, you're putting it together because Uncle Kyle is a doctor so he can't build things. I won't argue with that (and I won't let Kyle) so next time a gift requires assembly...you get the idea.
R, B and B playing on it in the garage!
This fun thing (80s throw-back???) has a happy home on our coffee table. Because who doesn't like to see their face all all puppy and green?
Despite all the new toys and the endless paper and boxes to play with...Maggie found her favorite thing mommy phone to play with.
Pop Pop aka Grandpa Robert (we're having inner-family conflict over what his name should be!) made a somewhat surprise visit. Rebecca was introducing him to the fabulous world of cute little dollies that smell like fruit and have shoes. He'll never be the same.
Kyle had to go to work later that day so our afternoon was more rushed than we would have liked but it was a fun morning and a great meal.
Christmas Day #2: Monday at Dahdo/Pam's
This should pretty much come as no surprise but I have no pictures from Christmas at my Dad and Pam's. I think as we were loading up the kids to head over that evening I asked Kyle if I should bring the camera and he and I said simultaneously no, its always so dark in their house. They like the mood lighting. Anyways, we had a great evening with D/P, my brother Alex and Diedre, and all 3 of Pam's boys and even a couple of their girlfriends. A full house. But so much fun. The kids actually got to stay and have a sleepover. And by sleepover I mean, stay-up-WAY-past-their-bedtimes-over. Like WAY past. We were finishing gift-giving and just hanging out when Maggie started fussing and Pam said oh, I wonder what's wrong with Maggie? Hello - it's 9:30! So, anyways, she got put to bed and then we left. The next morning when we picked up 2.5 horribly cranky kids we found out that Owen stayed up until just after midnight. And Rebecca was just before. Wow. :)
Christmas Day #3: Christmas Eve at Bee/JoJo's
We had already decided to forgo the Christmas Eve service at our church because it was just going to make the evening too crazy. Our plans included having dinner and festivities at Bee & JoJo's and then heading home for a relaxed evening. All started out as planned...
We munched on her always yummy appetizers (which means we basically ate dinner's worth and then some) while dinner was finishing up. Then the kids got to open their special Christmas Eve gifts - the "surprise" jammies! And some fun things from Uncle Alex. He hit a couple of real home-runs this year, the best being a remote-control doggie for Maggie. It was the source of total elation and mega frustration for our spunky 2.5 year old.
And that's all I've got folks. That one picture. Because before dinner (for the adults) even happened the effects of the previous nights' crazy hours had all but overwhelmed us. We fed the kids and my mom packed us food to go and we cut and ran. I am positive they were glad to get rid of us - we were definitely not helping the fun yet peaceful tone that everyone (including us) wanted.
So, to home, and to bed for 3 little ones!!!
Well, actually 2 at first. The girls were totally spent so they went right down. But Owen had heard Kyle and I talking about wanting to spend time that evening (with all of them) reading the Christmas story and he asked (in the sweetest way) if we could still do that. It was a really special time that we wouldn't have had if the girls had still been awake so it was actually a blessing in disguise that they were so awful at dinner and went straight to bed. Thankful.
And then to the garage for this man-beast...
That's me spying (and then getting caught spying) on Kyle as he assembled the jungle gym play dome thing we got the kids for Christmas. See Blake, Uncle Kyle CAN do it! :) While he did that I got breakfast prepped and made Jesus' birthday cake (which I forgot about until we got home...so had to improve as far as ingredients went).
Oh, I forgot to mention that as we were loading up to go to my mom's for dinner I sent the kids outside to get in the van while Kyle and I grabbed all that "last" stuff and closed up the house. Kyle had secretly been working on his assembly project during naptime = locked in the garage = so the kids had no idea (they probably thought he was at work) so the van was parked in the driveway. Owen comes running in and yells: Maggie opened the garage door and I'm pretty sure we weren't supposed to see what was inside! (Yes, that's our eldest for you.) So we run out and find Maggie in the driver's seat (don't worry, I had the keys) and she has in fact opened the garage. Luckily, all they saw was a bunch of weird little colorful metal triangles all over the floor. Owen made sure we were not going to tell him what it was while Rebecca begged us to tell her. Obviously we didn't.
Christmas Day #4: Christmas Day (for real!) at Home
Christmas morning the kids slept in (yea!) and we actually got up to an alarm just to get everything in place (including putting coffee in our hands). The girls jammies were a little cumbersome to actually sleep in but they were pumped to put them on the next morning like little Christmas costumes. [I hope we have 30 more years of them like this on on the stairs on Christmas morning, don't you?]
And outside...this is what waited for them. Looks like the primary-colored beginnings of a public park. But hey, if it gets the kids outside its a good thing!
Happy Birthday Jesus Cake
Owen was the first to run out and climb on!
Yea!
Every year I'm surprised how much the simple Pez Dispensers (a reluctant tradition of mine because I hate the candy but my mom always put them in our stockings and the kids always get a kick out of them). Oh, and our little yoggie got a yoga game that I'm just realizing I haven't played with her yet. On my list now.
Maggie didn't really play with anything (other than my phone, but what's new) she just opened them and then opened more of them (not always hers).
JoJo helping Owen sea saw (how sweet is that) and then Owen spending a good portion of the day working on a new lego set (a minor Star Wars ship).
Right about the time we finished up breakfast with Bee and JoJo, Nana came to join us! Here she is enjoying some princess time in a little castle with Rebecca.
We had a very relaxed day - stayed in our jammies and played.
NEWS ALERT: You'd figure this out eventually when I post the pictures of Owen and Rebecca's trip to DISNEY WORLD with Bee and JoJo, but...wait, did you catch that? Yes, Bee and JoJo took Owen and Rebecca to Disney World right after New Year's. (And I know you probably care about that more than all of these Christmas details but I have to do things in order or at least try to!) Anyways, O & R each got personalized Micky watches and t-shirts from them and then Bee asked them where they could all go to wear them together (B & J got them too)...she basically had to keep asking them questions until Owen finally guessed it. Even then he was a little confused and Rebecca asked if they were going today. They were definitely excited, but not knowing exactly what to expect they were easily distracted by the toys in the here and now (because a week away is a LONG time for a kiddo) so they went right back to their pez dispensers.
Other Christmas festivities and goodies...
The Nice Man with the Candy Canes
I am not sure how my mom found out about this sweet little place - she took them last year and all I remember is that they came home talking about "The Nice Man with the Candy Canes." So this year Kyle and I went back with them. And that's exactly what it is. A (very) nice man (and his wife) who spend countless hours every day filling their yard with every blinky flashly musica-playing Christmas and winter chotchky. And then they stand outside all evening greeting onlookers welcoming them into their yard to take it all in. And he hands out countless candy canes. My mom asked him why he does it every year and he simply said: for the joy it brings people.
Trail of Lights
A more well-known activity - the Trail of Lights! Thanks to the zip pass or whatever it was called that let us bypass the lines and go in a little early which definitely made the experience more enjoyable. I can't say Kyle or I was super-impressed with the actual display of lights (the tunnels were cool and some of the trees were really impressive but most of the walk seemed to be just light up particle board cutouts of different scenes) but it doesn't matter because we had a great time with the kids and they loved it.
Thanks to another visitor we actually got a picture of all of us! Its funny to me now that it didn't even occur to me to bring a stroller - love that!
The trees
The Austin skyline
The cell-phone blurry Zilker Tree in the distance.
And underneath it spinning around, right before sharing a funnel cake and heading home.
Pirates and Princesses - because aren't they in the Christmas Story somewhere?
No pictures of this little outing, and although the theme was anything but Christmasy it was definitely an event during our season...we took Owen and Rebecca to the Disney "Pirates and Princesses" show at the Erwin Center. Bought the groupon a really long time ago because a neighbor got me thinking how fun it would be...and while (for the kids) she was right, here is how the evening went:
1) Dinner w/ those sweet neighbors at EZ's - and actually this part really was fun. The 4 kids (their 2 and O&R - Maggie stayed with Bee) ate at their own booth right next to the adult booth. Can we do that? Oh yes we can!
2) The show. Holy cow Kyle and I both wanted to poke our eyes out. The lip-synced music, the super exaggerated "dance" moves...it couldn't end quickly enough.
3) The kids both had issues that we wouldn't buy them a super-overpriced super-cheesy super-gonna-break-in-a-day toy from the theme. In fact I believe one of them actually said that they were the only kids there that didn't get a toy. Kyle and I did some correction/rebuking/encouraging but decided to postpone a lot o what was needed because it was so late and they were tired.
In retrospect the show would have been perfect for Maggie in terms of age but I don't think we'll be making the effort to even this one out by taking her some day. We'll have to pick something else for our sake!
Some of the goodies this year:
One of the things that marks different Christmas years in my head are the little gifts we give to family friends and classmates. Here they are from this year
Perpetual Calendar
The idea here is that there is a little note card for each day of the year with a bunch of different lines and you write down something that happened that day or something you're thankful for. There are enough lines that the card can be used for several years. So the first year is sort of a labor of love with no reward (other than reminding yourself that every day you have something to be thankful for), but the 2nd year and beyond you get that plus you get a reminder of what was going on the year before. I kept one of these for myself and I'm still doing it - and it's Jan 11 as I write this - so I consider it a success so far!
Kid Photo Scavenger Hunt
We gave a lot of the kids' friends (and kids of our friends) a disposable camera with some instructions to do a photo scavenger hunt. I hear that the older ones (Rebecca and up in age) actually did it (at least loosely) and the younger ones just snapped away and that is just great and as we expected.
Painted Spoons
These are all over pinterest and were actually easy and fun to make. I bought a couple dozen wooden spoons on amazon and used craft paint I already had. The random stripes in red, green and white were done in layers but I was doing enough of them that by the time I painted all the first layer they were dry enough to paint the second color and so on. It was fun and I think I'll do them again with other colors just to have around my house or as housewarming gifts, etc.
All you need it: birdseed (huge bag at lowes/home depot for cheap),
flour, water, corn syrup, ribbon/string (and tins/cookie cutters and
straws for the making part). I found that 1 batch made about 24
ornaments depending on the size. I used both a candy/muffin tin (the
kind that is shaped like something) and also just regular cookie cutters
on a baking sheet or parchment paper - both worked well. The kids liked them and they were super easy and cute.
Okay folks, I think that just about wraps up Christmas. I'm exhausted. Are you??? In all seriousness, we say this all the time, but we are soooooo incredibly blessed to have all our family close enough to see them over the holidays. We had a very busy but blessed Christmas season in 2013.
