We Wish You a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

 

Here we are in the buzzkill days between Christmas and New Years Day, when everyone decides Christmas is over even though technically it is just starting.  You know that the 12 Days of Christmas start on Christmas, right?  It seems that most people forget that fact and throw their trees to the curb as soon as possible after Christmas.  The cute commercials and Christmas music stop and boring storage bins and cleaning supplies and the early Valentine's day merchandise start to take over the ransacked Christmas section at Target.  I admit that we will be taking our tree down tomorrow, New Years Day, because Justin will be home to help.  I will miss it's glow in the window but not the ornaments strewn about the house even though I constantly am putting them back. 

 

Our Christmas was good this year.  We visited the fam and were able to stay two nights at each house instead of packing and unpacking frantically.  Here are some highlights:

 

Christmas Eve:  My mom and I and Tessa headed to church, which started at 5:00 p.m.  We arrived at 5:02 p.m. to find that it had already started because there is a new minister this year and she apparently means 5 when she says 5.  Imagine that.  The church was full, the overflow folding chairs were full and the balcony was full.  As a consequence, we had to sit in the front row.  Well, the second row.  The front row was where the acolyte girls were sitting.  Yes, the front row is the last place anyone wants to be for some reason.  But it wasn't that bad.  The minister actually looks over you when you are in the front. 

 

 

Here are Tessa and I in our church clothes. 

 

Christmas morning:  Santa came and Ben got the bobcats he asked for!  He received the one shown below and also a smaller one.

 

Christmas night:  Tessa and my cousin's daughter Lauren had an adorable shared bath. 

After that they posed with my neice Claire and the huge Grumpy Cat plush toys that my brother gave them.  There is a third that was already packed in the car. 

Here is Tessa with the stocking my mom made.  A few months ago my grandma, who made these stockings for her kids, their spouses when they got married, and then all of her grandkids (8 total) was telling my mom that she didn't know what to do with all of them since she never hosts Christmas anymore and my mom had the idea of putting the new generation of kids' names on them. 

 

On Dec. 26th we headed to the lake.  On Saturday we opened gifts where Tessa proved that the cliché about babies loving the wrapping more than the gifts never goes away. 

 

I was excited for this gift opening because I made my niece and nephew quilts! 

 

The A is because her name is Adalyn. 

 

Spencer here loves vacuums so I made him a vacuum quilt.  No, they are not sailboats.  There is a cord stitched on each square too but it is hard to see here! I am proud of these because they are my first attempt at applique.  Believe it or not, a vacuum themed sewing pattern is a very rare thing to find so I drew this myself.  So if you ever year of someone needing one I guess I could share!  Haha...

 

Sunday morning:  Santa showed up with a bag of gifts for everyone! 

 

Yes, I said everyone, not just the kids.

After he left, I found Ben looking kind of forlorn and he quietly told me he was sad because he wanted to see the reindeer.  I told him to watch out the window but he probably couldn't see them because they had to get back to the North Pole really fast so Santa could start working on toys for next year. 

My age showed this year in the gifts I gladly received, which included snow boots, real Sorel negative temperature rated and water resistant snow boots similar to the ones I loved to hate in elementary school when we rural bus route kids weren't allowed on the bus without them on our feet and a memory foam pillow.  I also got some cordless headphones which I am enamored with after a few uses at the Y.  I always knew a day would come where I wouldn't have to spend time untangling a pesky cord every time I wanted to use headphones! 

Tonight we may actually go out and socialize because we have been invited to two parties!  They are kid friendly parties so the kids will be with us but that is OK since they had a babysitter last night.  I personally haven't gone out to do something fun on New Years Eve since 2009/2010.  In 2011 there was a blizzard and the next year I was pregnant and it has been all downhill from there as far as New Years Eve partying goes (I don't really mind, going out on New Years Eve was always kind of a taxi cab fiasco) so this will be pretty big. 

See you in 2015!