Christmas 2010

We had a complete blast! Unlike Christmases past, we had no puking, no plumbing problems, no huge meltdowns, no infant babies.

It was the best Christmas!





Seren woke up at 5:15 on Christmas morning. Yikes! Complaining of a stomach ache! The anxiety and lack of sleep had me panicking about a possible stomach bug all over again. The 'stomach ache' was sheer excitement! We made her wait up there until 6 am. She was in and out of sleep.

We woke her up with big Merry Christmas cheers! And then talked about whether Santa had visited or not until Wyeth woke up at 6:45.

We put on the tree and the kids came down. They loved that the tree had been trimmed by Santa! They ran to see if he ate the cookies. Seren was enthralled by the idea that Santa wrote her a note back. And the stockings were stuffed! She started bouncing up and down. "He stayed here and played with our stuff? And trimmed OUR tree?" We started with the stockings. And everyone loved the goldfish crackers. They happily munched and ate the fish.

Seren was particularly impressed that Santa remembered our cat Jordan. [Note, we actually totally forgot about this member of our family. Christmas eve found us crawling around out garage trying to find some random cat treats and wrapping in the Santa paper at 11 pm!]

Wyeth fed the cat a cat treat.
Seren fed the cat a cat treat.
The cat was happy.
Wyeth fed HIMSELF a cat treat.
Wyeth was not happy.

Here is a picture of him as he stood stunned by what just happened. Note the cat treat bag.



After about an hour of opening stocking stuffers [really!??], we had breakfast. I couldn't believe how slow the gift opening went. I was proud in that they didn't tear through it but it was kinda painful too! On Christmas eve, we started a new tradition with my in-laws. The kids opened presents with Bill and Linda via skpe. See below. It was the best! The kids LOVED it and it was fun to celebrate Christmas early with my in-laws. See them on the screen?



They got her a fairy house and she just LOVES the fairies!



They loved all of the gifts but Seren and Wyeth did a little bit too much "MORE" and "MINE" during the experience. We talked to Seren about this on Christmas Eve. That Christmas was about giving and sharing and not just getting. We also reminded her of how lucky she was to get gifts at all. We may have come down a bit more on the scrooge side but in a family that lives with such abundance, I don't want her to forget that some families had really no Christmas this year.

Anyway...back to the breakfast of banana shakes and other treats. We returned to the gits. The kids just loved it all. And we played with each item as it was opened up. Seren was really excited for some of Wyeth's gifts and asked if she could help him with the packaging when he couldn't open it himself. And Wyeth loved the excitement.

We had one minor meltdown and one MASSIVE meltdown. The mini meltdown happened when I took his goldfish cracker container and wrote an innocent 'W' on the side of it to distinguish Wyeth's crackers from Seren's. Fail. OH my holy gosh! I should have been put in prison for that crime! Crying and banging of feet happened.

The second massive meltdown happened when we tried to change him out of his pjs into his Christmas clothes. He had a massive meltdown. There was snot. There were tears. It was horrible! He DID NOT WANT TO GET OUT OF HIS PJS!!? Guess who was still in his pjs at 6 pm that night?

Seren and Sam wrote me poems for Christmas. I love these special poems. Sam writes a poem everyday. LINK. And when they write together, she dictates and he types. I loved mine and got all teary eyed with the emotion of the gift. So special!



But the main theme this Christmas was the real magic of Christmas! For Seren, she asked Santa for one gift this year. A 'doll bench'. This would be a place where her dolls could sit. On a bench. She asked for this time and time again. She asked Santa, when we saw him, for this item every time. She also threw in a 'new dolly' one time but the consistent item was a bench for her dolls.

After the stockings and breakfast, the monologue from Seren went something like this.

"Where is my doll bench? I thought Santa was not going to wrap it. But I guess he did. Or maybe I didn't get it. That's ok... But maybe the doll bench is here. Somewhere. Ya know, for my dolls."

After about 20 mentions of said 'doll bench' in about ten minutes, Sam and I looked at eachother and 'found' the one from Santa! The thrift store strikes again! Score!



Santa also gave her some lipgloss in her stocking. "Oh! Cool. Markers!" When I explained what they were she exclaimed "LIPSTUFF!!! JUST WHAT I ALWAYS WANTED!" THe other huge exclamation concerned, of all things, underwear. "Oh Mom! He must have known that I needed this. THis is really, really good! "

Seren also didn't leave Wyeth out of the mix. She was a bit concerned that Wyeth, Mr. not so verbal, might be worried that Santa wouldn't know what to bring him.

"Its ok Wyeth, even if you didn't tell him what you wanted, he knows. He knows you like cars and trucks and trash. He really knows these things. You'll see"

And Santa did know what Wyeth wanted!




After we opened about 80% of our gifts, the kids were overwhelmed. They ate goldfish in bed while Sam and I packed up for our trip down to my Mom and Dad's. We spent two nights down there and really enjoyed ourselves!




We finally arrived around 12. Santa had come there too! And my mom and dad spoiled us to gifts, salmon dinner, wine, raclette another night...and time with family.






After running around like maniacs with Uncle John after Christmas dinner, my mom had the kids do a little yoga! Deep breaths. Deep breaths.



The entire month of December brought us so much joy! We loved it all! We loved how much time we spent as a family! And we weren't stressed. Wyeth's bday was low key. And so was Christmas! I managed to get out my Christmas cards, succeed in not mailing a single thing at the US Post office and really enjoy the time! A full on success!

We can't wait for next year!