The Holidays

The fall and into the holidays I feel like we go not stop speed with trying to get everything festive in before the end of the year.  Plus I love to do all the festive things.  I was planning to do a creative post of 25 days of Christmas...but, that never happened.  So I'm just going to give some highlights with maybe a few comments (funny ones if you're lucky) in between.

Luke was super into Christmas this year.  He is so enthusiastic about most things, but the morning he woke up to a house full of Christmas decorations he was especially sweet.  "Mommy mommy mommy!!!  I just LOVE my Christmas. I just love it!  It's a special treat for me!,"he says jumping up and down with his eyes tightly shut and mouth moving faster than his little brain synapses could connect.

I have always loved Christmas, probably because my mom tried to do as many festive things as she could.  I'm glad he's just as excited about it as I am.  I mean someone else in this family has to be, right?!?!  When we took down all the Christmas decorations and boxed everything up, he said with tears flowing, "But Mommy, the decorations and Christmas stuff will be too lonely and super cold.  Don't take down my Christmas!"  I wish I got a picture of him sulking as we saw the boxes being put away.  However, he quickly perked up after I reminded him that now we have plenty of room to run and play with all our new toys.  He really enjoyed it this year and especially enjoyed singing Happy Birthday to Jesus, over and over and over.

So here we go with picture highlights.

Let us begin with Thanksgiving.  Each kid was so well behaved and Tim got to have his two Turkey dinners...everyone was happy:)

Went to the Duke Energy Train Display down at Union Terminal.  Luke was super excited to be there and there wasn't hardly anyone, so he got to ride the train on his own ringing the bell the whole way.  You can barely see him going by.

Decorating the tree and explaining that we can touch the ornaments but not destroy the tree.

We had fun with our Elf on the shelf this year.  Luke named him Ralphie.  Here he is escaping an attack by the dinosaurs.  Luke was sure to put the dinosaurs away every night so that Ralphie was safe.

 I put together a sensory bin with various "Christmas" items in it for them to sort, dig and enjoy.  This entertained both of them throughout the season.  It especially helped with getting dinner ready.  Carolyn especially loved the bin and dumping it all on the ground.

 

Putting the train on and on and on the track over and over, "Oh Carolyn.  I guess I have to fix it," he'd say.

Emma and I were able to take Luke and Owen on a double date to paint pottery. They loved painting and it was so nice to just spend time with them.  Luke especially enjoyed painting "Cod" in his Sharks mouth and painting band-aids on him too.

Luke had a Christmas program at school.  It was ADORABLE! And short:)

A few other things we did in preparation for Christmas (but I have no pictures of because we were busy having fun people):

• made ornaments for everyone
• made buckeyes, decorated beer/wine bottles, made white chocolate candy mix and gingerbread cookies to put in family baskets.
• made footprint banners and made them into a snowman scene for the grandparents.
• visited the Train display a few times
• visited a lot with family.  
• Had Christmas at our house this year...it was very nice to be able to stay home with the kids all day.
• made chocolate candy with my mom and Emma.  The boys helped to cover the chocolate oreos.
• made LOTS of different cookies: chocolate chip, gingerbread, sugar plus more.
• had a Santa beard to fill in for a count down to x-mas. 
• watched every Christmas show you could think of, but especially Rudolph, The Chipmunks, and the Grinch.

This had to be one of the funniest nights of the season.  We decided to go to Westwood United Methodist Church for their Christmas Eve service at 5:00.  It was awesome.  They told the Christmas story with very paraphrased narration and at each new point the kids were invited to come to the front of the church and receive an item that pertained to that part of the story (ie: Candy Canes for Sheperd staffs).  Well, in this picture you will notice that Owen and Luke are laying down on the platform in front of everyone.  After the service Owen explained they were being shepherds blinded by the light of the angel that it made them fall over, as it says in the Bible.  So they were only being Biblically accurate.  This whole service was a riot. 

Christmas Eve Carolyn did not sleep well and turns out she had a ear infection that ruptured.  Luckily the doctor gave a prescription for an antibiotic since Urgent Care would not be open for the next 36 hours.  Poor girl.  She sure was a trooper, just didn't sleep well.

We were all very excited for Christmas morning. A New Pete the Cat Book.  Plus we had Christmas at our house this year which was definitely a plus.

Luke saw his first movie...went to see Walking with The Dinosaurs, but got in free to see FROZEN instead.  Completely different story lines but we had a great time spoiling him while Christy watched Carolyn:)

listened to Bob Dylan's "Must Be Santa" a bazillion times.  This is too funny!

Happy New year!!!

We got to go to the Festival of Lights and it wasn't completely freezing.  

Luke and Carolyn LOVED the lights.

So there you go.  I think that's enough right now.