Christmas and Things

Wow- I can’t believe Christmas was already FIVE days ago! It’s so funny how you prep for a month for the most wonderful day of the year and then in the blink of an eye it's suddenly over. Oh, how I love Christmas! It’s so beautiful and magical and I know that part of the reason why it’s such a beautiful time is because you have to wait a full year for it. The anticipation of it is what helps it to be such a wonderful time of year! Our Christmas this year was pretty much the same as it’s been the last few years. We don’t live close enough to family to celebrate the holidays with them so it’s up to me to make sure that my three little cherubs are happy, full, and feel the magic of the season! It’s really not that hard to get them to feel the magic in the air because they believe in Santa Claus with every fiber of their beings! It is just the sweetest thing to have two little girls in the house who are so excited for Santa that they can’t even sleep at night! I know these years of them believing in Santa are numbered so I treasure every single moment of the Christmas season even more than I used to! I know that Christmas is also about Christ’s birth and we definitely talk about baby Jesus, sing "Away in a Manger", we go over the history of how He came into the world and how getting presents is symbolic of His birthday, but there is no denying that the magic of Santa is part of what makes Christmas so absolutely wonderful! 

First, we spent the night before Christmas Eve decorating Ginger bread houses and baking cookies for Santa because I knew we would have time on Christmas Eve. I spend all day in the kitchen on Christmas Eve and I absolutely love every minute of it! I really do! Smelling the bacon sizzling, the chopping of the vegetables, dicing things, boiling and grating potatoes, zesting lemons, rolling up meat, softening cream cheese, steaming veggies, etc.... just all of the prep work that goes into the appetizers that we eat on Christmas Eve is fun for me. This year after we ate dinner the girls' wanted daddy to read them a Christmas Book and then watch Charlie Brown’s Christmas so we did that and then it was bathtime and bedtime! After we made sure they were snoring, Shawn and I set out to put together all of their Christmas gifts from Santa. 

Sullivan’s grandparents bought him a little roller coaster thing that you can ride down and it’s super fun, but Santa brought him a train table. With both of those huge things out next to the tree it looked like he got three times as much from Santa has the girls did, but in all actuality his gifts are just bigger. It seems like the older kids get the smaller (in size) their gifts get. When they’re young, all the make-believe toys that they ask for are the big bulky kind. This year Piper just asked for Shimmer and Shine dolls and Lucy asked for a telescope. So both of their things were relatively small. 

Christmas morning came WAY too fast with the girls ringing their bells for Shawn and I, and then they raced down the stairs faster than you could even imagine. Piper's beautiful blonde hair was flying behind her as if she was in a car with the top down! That’s how fast she ran to the tree to scoop up her Shimmer doll and her Shine doll and proudly/excitedly exclaim that Santa brought her the right ones! (thank goodness!!) Then Lucy looked at her telescope, was excited for second, but ran over to Sullivan's toys to play with his instead, haha. So even though she is getting a little too old to ask for the big bulky stuff, she still enjoys playing with it. After all, she’s only six years old :) 

Opening presents this year lasted about an hour and then the kids were happy to play with their loot for the rest of the day! There was a lot of happiness and a lot of warm hearts all around. Shawn and I didn’t really do Christmas for each other this year because our cruise was our gift. We decided that doing that was definitely enough for us! 

The next day we all relaxed and the kids, once again, played with all of their new toys. The girls got these microphones that they carry around the house and they just talk in all day… The microphones are very loud! Haha it’s pretty cute but it doesn’t take long to wear on your nerves😜 

 

This was my gift from Lucy. If this isn't the most precious thing in all the world.....

Later that night we did something that we’ve never done before! Shawn took all three of the kids all by himself to Louisiana! He asked me couple months ago if we wanted to go to Louisiana during the week between Christmas and New Year’s and I told him I just had way too much stuff to do that I needed to get done. Projects that have been building up and I’ve been putting off because life has been extremely busy lately, so he offered to take the kids to Louisiana by himself! Now, I was super worried about him driving all three kids by HIMSELF (Sully is a nightmare to travel with) so he decided driving at night while Sully sleeps would be the best idea. So at 8pm on the 26th they left! They got there at 2:30am and he said they all slept almost the entire time!

I have been SO looking forward to "me" time for a LONG time. I have never stayed in my house ALONE for more than 24 hours. Well, not since having kids. It's been 6 1/2 years. If I'm ever away from my kids, it's usually me being out of the house and them staying home.  I've never been able to just be alone in the comfort of my own home! I have relished every second! And my accomplishments make me feel SO good! I have scrubbed baseboards, organized my pantry, patched up nail holes in the wall and re-painted, did SO MUCH LAUNDRY, put the Christmas decorations away, organized the attic, fixed the girls dresser, organized their closet, organized Sully's room and closet, cleaned out my bathroom drawers, vacuumed and shampooed my carpets, scrubbed every centimeter of my kitchen until it sparkled, and one day I spent SIX HOURS deep cleaning the girls' toy room. Yes. 6 hours. It was disgusting and SO unorganized and it's been driving me insane for months now! I also ran countless errands. I ran errands for 5-6 hours on two different days! Errands I haven't been able to run because it's too hard to bring Sullivan with me. I actually have done SO much in the past 4 days that I have been exhausted. I fall into a deep sleep every night and can't seem to wake up in the mornings! Haha, and I still haven't crossed everything off my to-do list! But, blogging is on that list so at least I'm getting closer and closer to the finish line with this :)  It has been good for my soul and good for my head to have all this time to myself.  To wake up in the morning and see that my kitchen is still immaculate and my carpet still has vacuum lines on it....to hear nothing but silence. This has been a gift for me. It might not have been relaxing, but I can tell you it was the best thing for my mental health.  I am crossing my fingers we can make this an annual thing, haha! Yeah right..... wishful thinking!

Anyway, the kids come home tomorrow and while I'm happy to see them, I think I could do with 2-3 more days, haha, but life and schedules won't allow it!

I hope everyone has a Happy New Year! I will have all the NYE loot that I've collected over the past few days out waiting for the kids for their return so that we can have our annual "party" in the living room and ring in the New Year together :) 

Happy 2018 everyone!

P.S. WE GOT SNOW! On the 22nd it was flip flop weather here (75 degrees and sunny) and the next day it SNOWED!!!!! It was a Christmas Eve Eve miracle! The kids played outside for hours. It wasn't much, but enough to keep them happy and it stayed cold enough that it didn't melt off of the roofs! So, technically we had a White Christmas :) And even though Sullivan kept knocking over all the tiny snowmen we built, we still had a blast!