Another Christmas, a more cluttered house…

"He who has not Christmas in his heart will never find it under a tree."
-Roy L. Smith

Christmas has come again in the good ‘ol DFW, which means a flurry of presents, driving, more presents, driving, yet more  presents, driving, and even more presents.  If you need a definition of the word “spoiled”, all you have to do is follow us around on Christmas to understand what the word means.  But ignore the presents for a moment and you will also be able to define other words such as family and love.  These kids may be spoiled, but they are also incredibly fortunate to have been born into a family like ours.

The day started at our house of course, where the kids were able to practice their unwrapping skills.  Despite all the new toys, including a ball pit and a piano that makes noise when you step on it, James’ present was a stick of Chapstick that he found in the stocking.  Seriously, he walked around with it all day.  I’m not sure if Ashlyn even paused between tearing open presents to see what she had opened before moving on to the next one.

Stop #2 was at Nina and Papa’s.  It was great to see Scott, Fonda, Auntie Sisa, Uncle Jeff, and of course Baby Ben.  Ashlyn was Nina’s helper and was happy to pass out gifts to everyone.

The traditional breakfast was served closer to lunch time, but that didn’t matter.  The kids had fun with PePa and their new basketball goal.

The final stop of the day was at Grandma and Grandpa Wolfe’s, where the kids got to play with Cousin’s Amy and Heidi, Uncle Brian, Aunt Jasmine, Uncle Bruce, and Aunt Tracy.

Merry Christmas everyone!

‘Twas the week before Christmas…

“Christmas is for children. But it is for grownups too. Even if it is a headache, a chore, and nightmare, it is a period of necessary defrosting of chill and hide-bound hearts.”
-Lenora Mattingly Weber

It’s the week leading up to Christmas, which means we finish the last of the shopping and start wrapping presents.  Unfortunately Mom made the mistake of putting a couple of presents under the tree early.  The kids will often go into the front room to play during the day, but we began to get nervous when it was unusually quiet.  Right before we were going to check on them, Ashlyn ran into the living room with an unwrapped present, laughed, dropped the present, and ran back into the room.  Luckily it was for me, so no harm was done, but we learned our lesson on putting things out before Christmas Eve.

As you can see, no unwrapped presents survived.  And somehow Ashlyn’s pants were removed during the process.  After putting on the pants and cleaning up the paper, we went to question the kids further about their behavior and we found James hiding in the dog crate with Rusty, happy as he could be.  Ashlyn was decorating the coffee table with hair conditioner.  We learned another valuable lesson about leaving the kids to their own entertainment.

Since Ashlyn already helped James unwrap a gift, it was only fair that Ashlyn should wrap her gift to James.  She had fun with it, and did a good job.  The present is now sitting up on the mantle, well away from prying hands.

James also got a quick haircut to get him ready for Christmas dinner.  Ashlyn had fun.  He did not.

With presents and hair out of the way, it was time for ginger bread houses.  We went the easy route this year and bought a kit, which you would think would be less work than making one from scratch.  It isn’t.  Or maybe I should say that it isn’t simple with an 18 month old who wants to break it rather than build it and a four year old who doesn’t understand that you have to wait to decorate or the house will fall apart.  Eventually we got some semblance of a house or two built, which we can decorate tomorrow.

Only 3 days until Christmas!  This is the first year that Ashlyn really “gets” Christmas, so we’re looking forward to some excitement on Christmas morning.  James of course has absolutely no clue what’s going on, but I’m sure he will rise to the occasion when he learns he can destroy wrapping paper.

To Freeport, and beyond!

"When traveling with someone, take large doses of patience and tolerance with your morning coffee."
-Helen Hayes

This post will mostly center around a trip to Freeport, TX (motto: “Fun Happens Here!”) this weekend.  But before I get to that, I thought I would share some pictures of Ashlyn and James learning how to play together in a new way.  James is now able to communicate “yeah!” when he wants to say yes to something, which has opened communication up quite a bit.  In this way, Ashlyn was able to ask James if he wanted to race in the living room, and after an excited “yeah!” off they went, back and forth, back and forth.  Most of the time Ashlyn had won and was racing back before James could get to the halfway mark.  James didn’t care, he simply turned around and happily went back to the starting point.  We’re curious to see what new games will be invented, it should be fun!

The trip down to Freeport was as good as you can expect with two small children.  Neither slept long enough, Mom was constantly doing things to keep them entertained, and Dad drove a separate vehicle because we had too many people traveling with us to fit all in one (the kids rode with the Grandparents because they have a DVD player in the car).  The first night was fairly uneventful.  We ate and took the kids to JT and Nancy Joe’s house to sleep.  It was there that Ashlyn found the new love of her life, the sit and spin.  We don’t know how she does it, but she spun for 10 minutes straight without getting dizzy.  I got dizzy just watching her.

Great Grandma Doodle’s 90th birthday party was a lot of fun for everyone, especially the kids.  There were toys, footballs, a large cake, slides, swings, balloons, other kids, and more cake.  There was a good turnout for the party, you could tell that a lot of people think very highly of Great Grandma Doodle.

The after party was at Leo and Elaine’s house.  I’m fairly sure the noise that ensued with all the kids in one house is why they Aspiring was invented.  The kids didn’t seem to mind the noise, I’m guessing the massive cake intake caused a sugar high that resulted in temporary hearing loss.

When we woke up the next morning, Ashlyn went straight to the sit and spin toy.  This time she thought it would be fun to take James along for the ride.  While Ashlyn can somehow spin for hours without getting Dizzy, James cannot.  The pictures below are in sequence to demonstrate how James reacts to the spinning compared to Ashlyn.  No children were injured during the taking of these pictures.

We rounded out the trip with some family pictures.  I made sure to get a picture with four generations of girls:   Great Grandma Doodle, Grandma Wolfe, Mom, and Ashlyn.

It was a great trip, and I know I can speak for everyone in my house when I say, “It was so much fun, we’re going to be early tonight.”  Happy Birthday Doodle!!