On the 4th Round of Christmas, My Family Gave to Me…

"Never worry about the size of your Christmas tree. In the eyes of children, they are all 30 feet tall."
-Larry Wilde

Christmas preparations happened in a rush in the days leading up to Christmas, but it was made easier by a few helpers who were happy to wrap and make cookies for Santa.

The traditional Christmas Eve dinner at Joe T. Garcia’s was a lot of fun as it always is.  It’s amazing to think this tradition has been in our family for going on 25 years now.

After dinner the reindeer food was spread on the driveway, Christmas PJ’s were donned, and cookies were set out for Santa.

Christmas #1:  Christmas started with the kids sleeping in, which is strange since James rarely sleeps in.  We gave them permission to come in our room and wake us up if they got up early but instead the parents were awake before the kids.

Christmas #2:  This year we had Christmas breakfast at Aunt Lisa and Uncle Jeff’s house.  Uncle Jeff did all the cooking and the kids did all the eating.  After breakfast the kids opened up another batch of presents and had fun with PePa.

Christmas #3:  The next stop was at Nina and Papa’s.  The kids had yet more fun tearing open presents.  Isla ended up taking a nap with Nina, apparently three Christmas’ is her limit.

Christmas #4:  Off to Grandma and Grandpa Wolfe’s for Christmas dinner.  Oh yeah, more presents!

Thanks everyone for a fantastic day.  Merry Christmas everyone!

Smiles and crafts…

"Christmas is a tonic for our souls. It moves us to think of others rather than of ourselves.
It directs our thoughts to giving."
-B. C. Forbes

Little Isla keeps growing, as babies tend to do, and when she’s not being fussy she’s  becoming more social as well.  While the pictures below look like she’s trying to eat the person she’s playing with, she’s actually in the process of grinning.

Like this.  She’s also started the stage where she’ll attempt to grab everything in front of her whether or want her to or not.

James is also still his smiley self.  Most of the time anyway.  Usually when he’s not it’s because he has engaged in some competition with his big sister and unfortunately for him he rarely wins.  Someday when he’s bigger he might have a fighting chance, but for now hit only hope is to win a few times against Isla when she becomes mobile.

As proof that Isla will smile without trying to eat someone, here are a series of pictures of Isla in her pink and grey baby prison hoodie.  Awww…

And here is a picture of Isla and Pe-Pa, who came over for breakfast and entertained the little one for a bit. Notice the distinct lack of trying to eat him.

Christmas is a time for giving, not receiving, and this includes Rusty.  The first present under the tree this year was wrapped by the children for our favorite canine.

The gifts didn’t stop with Rusty, Ashlyn expressed interest in making gifts for the grandparents.  So out came the craft bin and the kids got busy making some presents.  I have blurred out the works in progress because I’d be in big trouble if the secret got out.

Santa and a birthday…

"Mom:  James, did you eat it?"
James:  No, I smashed it."

With all the Christmas preparations we took very few pictures this week.  In fact we didn’t really break out the camera until the Wolfe clan came over for a birthday dinner for Uncle Bruce and Cousin Heidi.  It was a typical dinner with the family, the kids ran around crazy and the adults tried to keep the kids from destroying everything while dinner was being put on the table.  They had fun though as they always do.

We also got the kids out to the mall to have their picture taken with Santa.  Ashlyn did great, James was scared and broke down right as I put him on Santa’s knee.  Every family needs at least one of these pictures.

Only 11 days until Christmas!

Painting, jumping, and giving…

"For it is in giving that we receive."
-Francis of Assisi

In typical Texas fashion we had some great outdoor weather right before it went back to freezing this week.  The kids took the opportunity to decorate the playhouse in the backyard and then Ashlyn had Mom make her into a kitty.  Afterward we continued to enjoy the weather by grilling up some street-style chicken tacos.  There was no argument, no screaming, just a family enjoying their time together.  Those moments are rarer than I’d like, but I’ll be happy to have them even if just occasionally.

Like most girls her age, Ashlyn will take any opportunity to dance.  So to help entertain and keep her active in the winter we bought a dance game for our PS4.  James and I tried to compete with her, but it didn’t work out.  You can see how gracious Ashlyn was in victory.

Isla continues her slow move to normalcy.  She’s still fussier than the average baby but she always has a smile for Mom now, and I think this is a good sign of happier days to come.

The kids ran outside to play on Saturday while we did some work indoors.  I looked outside and saw them both jumping on the trampoline together.  This may not seem like much but it was the first time James had enough coordination to not be scared being up there with his big sister.  Go kids go.

I’ll go ahead and admit it, James’ room was really dull.  We painted it blue when we knew we were having a boy and then for some reason stopped there.  Mom remedied that this weekend by adding dinosaur paintings, shelves, an Elmo rug, along with more Elmo and Tiggers than I can count.

We tried to get pictures with Santa but the line was too long and the kids too impatient.  We did get to adopt a child from Salvation Army’s Angel Tree and got to teach Ashlyn more about charity and giving.  When we got home we took advantage of them being dressed up to take our own set of Christmas pictures.  Ashlyn convinced James it was better to make goofy faces than smile.