'Twas the Month Before Christmas

I’m really not sure how December is already almost over, Christmas is 3 days away, and the last blog I wrote was right after Thanksgiving. There was a whirlwind of holiday activity and kids sporting events mixed with work craziness that made the last 22 days go by way too fast.

We decorated the tree (purchased at the Merc again), ate the traditional pigs in a blanket dinner, and watched the annual showing of Shrek the Halls with Nana earlier in the month.  Most of our shopping was done early. I’ve enjoyed WAY too many Starbucks specialty holiday drinks in their seasonal red cup, but I feel like I haven’t heard enough Christmas music yet. I think I need to put on the new Elvis  Christmas album in the next day or two before it gets packe
d up for another year alongside last year’s album, Beach Boys Christmas.

Worst Parenting Moment during the Holidays:  That would have to be the night we were driving home through our neighborhood, looking at all the decorations, and Faith said, in all innocence and honesty, “Mom, why is Jesus around so much during Christmas?”.  I hesitate to even write that story here as I know it indicates a huge failing on my part to educate my children about  the true meaning of Christmas… but when we started this blog we did so with a goal to be honest and not just write the good stuff. So… there have been a few “lessons” about the history of Christmas since then!!

Mary and Auntie Sue arrived on December 17^th, just in time for the kids holiday music program at school. They were really excited about the event and Faith especially has been singing the songs for months. I admit I lost my mind a little bit when I received an email from the music teacher urging me to send the kids to school that day in “holiday colored western wear” for the theme. Really??? At this time of year I feel lucky if my kids leave the house with underwear on. So the idea of holiday themed cowboy shirts almost threw me over the edge. The concert was a lot of fun, though. 

This is the first Christmas the kids have spent with Auntie Sue since Faith was about 18 months old so they were really excited to have both their grandma and favorite aunt here to celebrate. Mary and Sue also got to join us for a very long but very fun 12 hour day of basketball playoffs on Saturday. It was a single elimination tournament and no one, including Jake, thought they had a chance of making it past the first round (an 830AM game) but they pulled it out and went onto play another nail biter at 130, another at 330, and played for the championship at 630 that night. They lost by one but played great and had so much fun. Jake played his heart out.   

Sunday night we got an early Christmas present- a night out at a downtown Boise hotel while the kids’ favorite babysitters of all time (Grandma Mary and Auntie Sue) watched them. There was gingerbread house decorating to be done and holiday movies to watch and the kids couldn’t wait for us to leave and probably never wanted us to return! More and more treats keep appearing out of suitcases- color crayons and coloring books, See's candy, holiday cookie decorating trays, games, etc… You never know what might appear next and the kids are eating it up. They have been playing cards nonstop (SkipBo and Phase 10) and learned to knit while we were away last night. Those two ladies have more energy and patience in their little fingers than this mama has in her whole body!

The shopping is done, the house is decorated, the cookies are baking, the cards have been sent. Tomorrow we will make the Chex Mix (Christmas just isn’t Christmas until the Chex Mix has been made!). We are all ready for Santa to come. The kids are already asking what time they will be allowed to come downstairs in the morning (Is 8:00 too late??) and are already making plans for who will be sleeping where for their annual Christmas Eve sleepover.

Thanksgiving 2014

Thanksgiving was a whirlwind of family, friends, food, shopping, kids, movies, and sleepovers- with only a dash of sickness thrown in for good measure.  Sheila and Wayne arrived with Shelby and her boyfriend Kody on Saturday night, then Sam and his girlfriend Sarah arrived Sunday night.  Jake came down with a quick case of strep throat on Tuesday afternoon and due to the quick trip to the dr as soon as the symptoms began, was on the road to recovery by the time Kim and Bill and Abby and Aidan got in on Wednesday evening.  After a quick dinner of frozen lasagna (nothing but the best for our guests!), the cousins played together until bedtime when the Evans headed to mom’s house to sleep.

We divided up the cooking duties on Thursday with Sheila taking the bulk of the heavy lifting- turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, and gravy (because if they hadn’t been in town the truth is that we would have ordered in pizza!).  Kim and I made a decadent and delicious brussel sprout recipe, rolls, icky salad, and a green salad with bleu cheese, walnuts, and pomegranate seeds. Mom made the pies and brought the ham. Yes, we had both ham AND turkey as there was a clear division on who wanted what so we decided to just do small versions of each. In the end we had 16 people at dinner. The kids spent the day running around the neighborhood and house playing hide-and-go-seek and playing video games. Mom had us all go around the table before dinner and say out loud what we were grateful for- and somehow we all spontaneously held hands in the circle and it was actually kind of fun.  There was football on TV of course and a neighborhood game at the green near our house that both boys played in.  Dinner was delicious and after a walk around the neighborhood we all enjoyed pie and ice cream. The kids watched a movie and had a sleepover in Tanner’s room.

On Friday Brian got up early to do some Black Friday shopping- sparked due to a great sale on something we are getting for Faith this year. He came back with a few Christmas presents for the kids and also the weight bench he had wanted. He spent some of the day putting that together while Kim and I headed downtown for lunch and some shopping of our own. Then later that afternoon we piled into two cars and headed out to Big Al’s- an arcade/bowling alley/bar/restaurant. Brian had been given a $100 gift card to the place months ago so we gave each of the five kids $10 in tokens and we headed to the bar for a beer and snacks while they played for over an hour. We tried to see the lights and Santa at the outdoor shopping center  nearby but the place was mobbed and we couldn’t even get close to Santa’s Village so we headed elsewhere for a quick dinner before heading home where the kids watched another movie and Kim, Bill, Brian and I watched Music and Lyrics. I still am a sucker for Hugh Grant.

Saturday afternoon brought us all to the Egyptian Theater downtown where we kicked off the season right with a lively, sing along showing of Elf. It was cold outside (no pun intended) and Faith bundled in Brian’s Under Armor sweatshirt as we walked a few blocks to dinner at Proto’s pizza.  That night the kids built a huge fort and everyone slept in it. I had my doubts but they all slept well- until almost 845AM.  We had to bring the Evans family to the airport later that morning and our long weekend concluded with regular Sunday chores for all.

But our feeling of gratefulness continues. This evening, taking Faith to gymnastics, I was reminded again how lucky we are. It was snowing for a lot of the day and by 5PM had turned to freezing rain. We drove under the overpass on the way downtown and the kids spotted an unusually large group of homeless huddled underneath, trying to stay warm and dry. Independent of me they decided that instead of stopping to get dinner on our way home, as is our usual custom after 5PM-6PM gymnastics class on Monday, we should make sandwiches at home and put the money that we would have spent on our dinner toward food to deliver to the homeless people we passed.  Jake decided to add on $5 of his own money and Faith wanted to donate an additional $2 of her own money. So, after gym, we went to Albertsons and picked up some loaves of bread, lunch meat, sliced cheese, peanut butter, a bunch of bananas, and a box of Andes mints and brought the bags of food to those much less fortunate than ourselves. The mints were a complete after thought- they were sitting at the register and when one of the kids said we should bring them dessert, I kind of scoffed as I added them to the basket. But as the people passed the bags around we heard one gentleman say to his friend excitedly, “Look! There’s mints!”  It was all the kids idea and I was so proud of them. We came home and made hot oatmeal and PB waffles for dinner with the kids feeling so happy that they made a difference in someone elses life tonight.

Happy Thanksgiving to all!