Christmas - here we come!

I love Christmas!  I love the decorations, I love how people take the time to be happy and I love the bell ringers standing at the door.  I love the season.  I'm actually glad that Christmas is in winter here, because it is about winter's only redeeming factor.  (I'd love Christmas in the summer too - but overall I enjoy summer more than winter. :) )

This year I've been thinking about a few other things.  The first thing is that I've been marveling at how many people celebrate Christmas.  Sure - most of them don't really understand where "Santa" came from or the history behind Christmas.  And many - even though they say Merry Christmas - don't really even know or care about the fact that Christ was born.  And yes - I realize Christ wasn't really born Dec 25 and that it is thought that perhaps religious leaders were piggy backing on other pagan holidays...but we don't say "Happy Winter Solstice!" to each either! 

Isn't that amazing?  The birth of one person has affect the world in such a dramatic way?  It is really undeniable.  I've heard the argument "Well Christians keep it alive."  Ok.  Perhaps.  But I don't see us celebrating the birth of Ghandi on an international level either. 

The bottom line is that this little baby came to this earth and changed it forever.  And there isn't really anyone else that can claim that.

The other thing I've been thinking about is Mary.  Being pregnant and having two very good friends who are very pregnant (as in - due to give birth ANY day now!) probably put it on my mind a little bit.  Mary sat on a donkey for 3 days.  THREE DAYS!  Nine months pregnant!  I have trouble sitting in a chair for an hour straight (at 28 wks) - let alone a donkey.  And I'm fairly certain my couch is probably more comfortable than her donkey...just saying.  What was she saying?  Was she complaining at Joseph the whole time?  "That darn Ceasar Augustus!  Why can't I be at home?  Why do we have to do this now?  THIS ISN'T WHAT I WANT TO BE DOING RIGHT NOW!"

I realize most people like to picture Mary as the perfect woman.  But...she was human.  So she wasn't perfect.  And I think we would all understand if she griped about having to be on a donkey.  And it may be that she didn't gripe - because she was familiar enough with the prophecies to understand she wouldn't be giving birth at home. (I have no clue.  I'm just pondering here.)  What I do know is that after riding on the donkey and then giving birth in a stinky barn, the Bible says this:

But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart. ~Luke 2:19 (NIV)

 If you've ever had a baby then you understand as a woman how important the birth story is.  Many write it down so they don't forget.  (I usually do - I think I have them for all 3!)  And even though I know that Mary knew she was giving birth to our savior and this baby's importance...the bottom line is that this child was Mary's first kid. And she birthed him.  It is the most natural thing in the world to be sentimental over it.  I can only imagine how it must have been amplified knowing who the child was.

But then this morning I was reading...and I saw this.

... But his mother treasured all these things in her heart.  ~Luke 2:51 (NIV)

 Again.  This time Jesus was 12.  Here is my take on it - as a mom we are told all the time..."It goes by so fast!" and "Don't blink!  Your kids will be gone!"  Mary, a young mother, recognized this.  She understood it was ok to hold these experiences near and dear because they would soon be gone.  And despite the fact that her son was...special...Jesus was still her kid.  And I'm certain she loved him like any other mom loves any of their kids.  (Let's be honest.  Most of us believe our kids are special!  And that is OK!  It is God's design!)

I love the fact she recognized this and it is a good lesson to myself.  Enjoy my kids.  Take pleasure in them.  Treasure this time.  Because it is short.

Christmas Stories

 Rebekah woke up bright eyed and bushy tailed at 3 AM.  She came hopping into our bed and said "Has Santa come? Has Santa come?"  Yes.  No you can't open your presents.

We did manage to get her back to bed.  Later my mother-in-law (MIL) told me that Rebekah had told her of a dream she had.  Rebekah said that in her dream Santa had left two presents in his sleigh and he had to come back.  We thought that rather ironic...because there were two presents that the ILs got the kids that were set apart.  They had to open the gifts from my parents first.

As soon as the turkey was in the oven, the kids were allowed to open their presents.  By this time, I had already had my shower.  

Everyone in their Christmas PJs

It was nice that I didn't have to go digging for my tripod, since William's family joined us for Christmas.  The took the shot.  (I framed it...I wanted to ensure I got a good picture.)  And I did...I love the look on Rebekah's face here.  And yes...that is a huge pile of presents.  Our stuff plus all the stuff William's family brought.  They are a very generous bunch.

I didn't take too many pictures during present opening - but suffice it to say that there were plenty of presents, wrapping paper and trash.  The kids had a ball.

Rebekah's favorites included her zhu zhu pet, zhu zhu habitat, Leapster 2, Kirby's Epic Yarn (video game for Wii) and guitar.

Peter's favorite gifts were his football helmet, football, remote control car, race track and guitar.

At one point Peter was over by Thomas (William's brother). 

Peter:  You have  football on your shirt!
Thomas:  I do!  It is OU!
Peter:  Oh-ME?

One surprise of the day was my present.  I had mentioned I was saving for a dSLR.  I told William which one I chose and that I was going to get it.  Well...I ended up being short.  So I told him I was going to wait to purchase it a few weeks until I had enough.

My sweet husband went and not only got the camera (which is all I was planning on purchasing), but purchased a camera case, memory card and an extra lens.  He said he went back for the extra lens later, and thought he had given the entire surprise away in doing so.  I'm normally observant.  It is usually pretty hard to surprise me.  BUT - he got away with it.  I was shocked.  He told me he had a super secret errand to run.  I had a suspicion he was buying a new DVD player for upstairs.  We had briefly discussed it the night before and he had looked up prices.  Frequently this is as good as purchasing it for William.  ;-)  That is just the way he tends to be.  By the way - I'm super proud that we still do NOT own a brand new DVD player!  Errr...Blueray. 

Anyway, Christmas was a wonderful day.  Peter wore his football jersey all day long (which wasn't even the main present...LOL  It happened to come with his helmet!) and Rebekah wore her nightgown all day long.  The jammies were the only official gifts from us this year.  Everything else came from Santa.  Frankly, I was too exhausted to figure out which thing should come from Santa so we just decided it would all be from Santa.  I doubt we'll do that again next year.

Some shots taken with my shiny new camera.  :-)

Taken by William :-)

(It needs cropped...BUT with 18 MP sitting around NO PROBLEM!)

My new camera is SU-WEET!  It takes pictures so fast and taking indoor pictures is such a snap.  I am in camera heaven...and I finally have the tool to begin taking creative pictures again.  (I used to take photos as a hobby...before kids.)

And one last shot of all the kids on Christmas Eve before church.

 

Peter absolutely REFUSED to wear his nice clothes.  I wasn't happy, but didn't feel like forcing a rather strong 3 yo into an outfit.  The girls were adorable in their matching dresses though! :-)

I had more stories but I simply can't recall them now.  This is probably why William was able to fool me. ;-)

Christmas Posts completed!

...but I back dated them.  I wanted them to show up in the appropriate month! :-P

Pre-Christmas Festivities
THE Christmas Tree
Christmas Day

I wonder if this is a new tradition?

I feel compelled to update on how we have done in Dec. with our goals. No idea why...maybe because I've shared so much so far, it seems silly to stop now.

I will say that during Christmas, historically, we have racked up the most debt. We all go a little crazy. So this season was a particular test for us.

We did not get anything really paid down. No extras to the ol' debt bank. BUT...and to me, this is huge...we did not put a single thing on credit and paid cash for everything.

Huge people...HUGE! We did it! To me, this is JUST as good as paying down the debt...for now anyway!

And, we also received additional blessings from God. If you recall, we were having a bit of TV troubles. Well, William being the gadget man he is really had a bug for a new TV. It didn't help that the manager had promised 'a good deal'. But NO worries...we did NOT slip!

William received a surprise from work - a $200 gift card. We also received Christmas money from my parents and pretty much just gave each other Christmas money. With all of it (including the 'great deal' from the Best Buy manager), he was able to buy the below...

William calls it the little TV. I keep telling him that is simply bragging...while it is smaller than the TV downstairs, I think a much better title would be "the TV upstairs". Ah well...semantics I guess. My point, is we are yet again very blessed. Very very blessed.

By the way - we bought our last 'big TV' the Christmas after we moved into our last house. I just found it a little funny.

So to recap...no additional debt, new TV and we are still sticking with our goals. We are doing good. YAY US!

Christmas Day

Christmas Eve is snowed all day long.  I attempted to love every bit of it, but considering that the ILs were supposed to come into town for Christmas...I had trouble.  They ended up not making it, which was a pretty big bummer for us all.  But, we took a deep breath and enjoyed our Christmas Day anyway!

Self-portrait!

(Peter is actually yawning here...)

Kids Christmas morning in front of the tree...sillies!

Peter attached himself to this present and carried it around.

The interesting thing is that this present belonged to William.  He didn't really care about his pile...

Rebekah and her pile...she was NOT interested in getting her pic taken.

WOO HOO!  That is REALLY cool!

Ummm...what is it?

Rebekah was kind enough to help Peter with opening his presents.

Presents everywhere!

These are some dress-up clothes they received from William's folks.

I love it...and NOT just because Peter is wearing a dress!

We had a great time Christmas day.  I had a ham scare, but it worked out.  The food was wonderful, and we made entirely too much.  I always do...but you know, better too much than not enough!  Seriously!  We hung out and played with my family all day long, and it was a complete blast.  Since I have a video game playing family...we played a lot of the New Super Mario Brothers for the Wii.   We had a really good time...ok, I did.  I think everyone else did too!

THE Christmas Tree

I'm a nut.  I love putting our tree up in November...William and I have compromised to have it put up at the end of November, instead of the beginning. ;-)  But there have been years, due to schedules, it has gone up at the beginning.

We let Rebekah put the star on

 

The tree has a lot at the top...but it is fairly dispersed.

 

We learned that the 'safe zone' was much smaller than we thought

 

And...I don't know if you can tell, but by Christmas, nearly all 

ornaments were at the top 1 FT of the tree.

 

The saga of the tree...next year, we may simply NOT put anything breakable on the tree, depending on Peter's disposition at the time.

Pre-Christmas Festivities

The last few years, our neighbor would dress up and come over as Santa and surprise the kids.  THIS year, of course we have moved.  No more personal Santa.  I debated taking Rebekah to the mall...but you know?  It is crowded and I hate crowds.  We happen across this Santa attending a friends dance recital at the YMCA. 

We stood in line FOREVER to see this Santa.  Forever.  The kids were running around like loons, William and I lugging everything (until we had the genius idea to set our coats down someplace).  Rebekah talked the entire time about how she was going to tell Santa that she wanted a "Barbie with a whale".  (This translates into a Barbie she saw in a store that came with dolphins.)

So after all that waiting...we get up there and...

She won't hardly talk to him...

 

Peter wouldn't come within 2 ft of him...EXCEPT to get an offered candy cane.

 

This poor Santa...he was red faced, they had fans blowing...people kept asking him if he needed a break.  He DID need a break, but he was so terrified of disappointing children!  I hoped he would take a break...after our visit.  :-P

We also made some cookies.  These were just sugar cookies...the kids have a lot of fun with them.  When they get older, we'll add frosting or whatever...but for now I stick to simple sprinkles.  (You can see why below.)  These are WELL sprinkled cookies.  The kids are definitely experts at it. 

 

One funny little story...we left these cookies within Solomon reach accidentally.  He ate them...every last one.  They were talking about Santa in school...about what you might leave Santa.  Rebekah reported to her teachers that Solomon ate the cookies for Santa, so now he will have nothing.  LOL  This was the middle of Dec...no way they would have lasted that long anyway.  But it became a class joke!

I walked in to this later...and thought it was hilarious.

The dog was just the final touch...

I'm glad we have a big bed!

Christmas Eve we made candy.  We made coconut balls, chocolate covered pretzels, Oreo cookie truffles, happy candy, pecan clusters...I think that was it.  While the kids were helping (they helped in and out all day), and we were stirring the mix for the coconut balls, Peter decided to really stir it...

I reminded William messes will be messes, but let's have fun.  :-P

 

And that is all we really did as far as goodies go.  Oh - we did make brownies for the Christmas caroling and Rebekah helped me with a bunch of pies I had made as well.  She LOVED making pies and learned a very important lesson...no one likes egg shells in their pie.  :-)  Which she repeated to nearly everyone she ran across.

Christmas is coming!

I am a Christmas fool. In just 21 short days, it will all be over. We have our tree up and our house decorated. (Even went and bought a couch so our decorations would look right...HAHA!)

I want to savor every moment of it. This year I hope to venture into candy making. I've assisted a friend the past couple years and thoroughly enjoy it. So my goal is to try this year and to find some sucker to do it with me. I can't imagine it being as fun doing it by yourself as it would be with a buddy.

Other "traditions", last year we made sugar cookies with Rebekah and we also bought a ginger house kit. It has been sitting on the counter all week, and EVERY day she asks if we can build it, is it Saturday yet, why can't we do it today? She was super excited that TOMORROW is the big day and I fully expect to be woke up at 6:00 AM sharp with a little girl sitting on me informing me it is Saturday and time to make the ginger bread house.

I'd love to find some traditions that do not involve food. It would be GREAT if I could associate memories and traditions that Rebekah will not struggle with as she gets older. Do I eat this cookie? I'll get fat if I do...that sort of thing. But, that could be me simply projecting my own personal struggles onto a little girl who has yet to discover them. She may never worry about eating a cookie or have weight struggles.

I recently read a book (in which I'm sure I'll attempt to blog about soon) where food was heavily involved in tradition. They embraced the fact that food was inspiring and an integral part of the culture. I'm trying to think about it in those terms and let go of my notions about food and weight.

We also do go Christmas caroling with our church, and when we are in town we attend a church service on Christmas Eve. I have some Christmas books we read about the REAL meaning of Christmas, and we also drive around and look at lights at least once. Not much...but we are an infant family working to create our own traditions. We've embraced our own family traditions that we are willing to embrace (William brought Santa, I brought the advent calendar) and looking for new things to make Christmas special for our kids.

In 21 short days I'll be feeling the "Christmas let down"...it'll be over, and I'll be sad that I have to wait yet another year for this time of year again. 21 days! It will definitely go entirely TOO fast (which is why I'm not opposed to putting up the tree after Halloween...yes I am one of those people!).

Finally...Christmas photos!!!

We had a GREAT Christmas this year. Usually, something happens. This year...nada. I'm very relieved. Here is a TON of pictures from our THREE Christmas'. The kids were thoroughly spoiled...and now William and I have the difficult task of figuring out where to put all the STUFF! ACK!

Santa came to visit! Rebekah told him she wanted a black robot (of course!)

Peter was not a Santa fan...

For Rebekah's school program, she got to be a shepherd.

I liked how this pic of the two of us turned out!

Kids in front of the tree...hard to get a pic, because

they were a little excited for the presents. This was the best one.

And one of the family (of course!)

First thing she saw was the parrot. She enjoyed talking with it!

Peter really enjoyed the whole present thing,
even though he wasn't fast at opening them.

Mr. Potato head parts...a hit!

The kids opening their "loot"!

Kids in font of the tree at William's parent's house.

A good one of the kids together!

Peter (for some reason) was more interested in my
presents than his...which is OK! Just funny!

Rebekah licking the bowl after I made some whip cream
(for a coconut cream pie). Christmas at my folks house.

Rebekah had just as much fun with Peter's toys as Peter did!

Opening a present at Granny's house (my mom)

Who needs toys?

I hope everyone had a MERRY CHRISTMAS! I'm already looking forward to next year. It is my favorite season after all. ;-)

Christmas Baking

I've been negligent in posting photos. So...now I'm going to post probably way too many. :-D Since I have so many...I'm going to split them into various categories. This particular post is dedicated to all the scrumptious Christmas goodies made this past month!

The best part of making a ginger bread house...

No, I wasn't eating the candy...

Yes...some candy actually did make it onto the house!

I think she ate more candy than she put on the house.

Finished product!!!

Rebekah was very liberal with the sprinkles...we discovered that was a good thing on sugar cookies. (This was the first time I had ever made them...with help from Pillsbury of course!)

Yes...she was very proud.

I also made a bunch of Pecan pies for various events. Rebekah helped me with most of them. She would proudly tell people that she made the pies "just for them". LOL! (It didn't matter who it was really...the pie was always just for them!) She loved pouring things into the bowl, handing me the eggs and helping to stir! And after a few pies (I made a lot of them this last season), if she knew I was going to make one she would beg to help...so I made sure I made them at a time that she could help (except for two...which funny enough turned out kind of weird! HA HA!).

I also attended a candy making party. That was pretty fun (honestly - more fun than I thought it was going to be!!).

A dorky picture of me...making candy.

Some of the pile of goodies we made.

We made over 300 peanut butter balls.

That's about it...it was fun. I guess now it is back to healthy eating!!!