Chrismtas 2006

How to catch up with all of the festive activities and my moods? They were both vast and frequent. Let's go back, back, back....all the way to December 23rd.

Christmas Eve Eve

Officially the busiest day of shopping the entire year. And who was out in the thick of it? Yours truly, someone who doesn't like crowds, stores or traffic. I started out going to Target, then grocery shopping for all of the holiday meals and onto a few different stores hoping to find that last minute perfect gift. Jay built a snowman with the boys with the perfect sticky snow.

Seth's pose. He always seems to be making this face for the camera.

Curious....

I captured the building of it but forgot to go back outside and take a picture of the final product. But they all had fun. I'm not sure Henry loves the snow but perhaps it was his big marshmallow outfit that impeded his movement. Once I got home, Jay realized we had never taken the boys to get gifts for each other. So we all loaded into the truck and drove up to the White Elephant (a junky store that has a lot of toys and games....along with guns, fishing equipment, and a whole lot of other random stuff). Back home for dinner and putting the boys to bed. Seth finished his final draft of his wish list and the number one thing he wanted was a Denver Broncos football jersey. Jay and I were fairly certain that Santa hadn't yet made this particular gift and discussed the pros and cons of Seth not getting his beloved item. Ultimately, we decided that Seth's disappointment was worse than spending money on a jersey he'd most likely grow out of this year, be uninterested in in a few months when march madness starts and which also has the number of a certain quarterback who won't be with the broncos after this year. We called around to several stores and found one out at the valley mall. Jay left on his own Saturday night shopping hell while I read tucked under a blanket.

Christmas Eve

Jay made the boys pancakes with homemade syrup for breakfast. Seth is a pancake monster. He can ingest about 4 whole plate pancakes. Of course, Sammy doesn't really like them so he's always a light eater on pancake mornings. After cleaning up the breakfast dishes, it was already time to get ready for choir and church. The boys took showers and I put Henry down for a catnap to help him cope with the upcoming brutal four hours of restricted movement. Our ward choir performed four numbers during Sacrament meeting including the prelude so I sat up on the stand the entire time and Jay came up after the sacrament. We asked a couple pregnant with their first child to hold Henry and had hoped that Seth and Sam would be happy coloring in our bench the rest of the time. Sammy had different plans, however, and immediately moved up to sit with them and torture Henry. He thinks he's loving him but all of the squeezes and tummy taps irritate Henry and he ends up screaming. Jay and I were in agony watching it all. The meeting went long (of course) by twenty minutes and eventually the young future father had to take Henry out. Merry Christmas Eve!

After church, I made chili for dinner and set about wrapping the traditional Christmas eve jammies.

Seth's Christmas pajamas

Sammy's Christmas pajamas

Henry's Christmas pajamas

The boys and I made some Christmas cookies for Santa and we sprinkled oatmeal out on the lawn for Santa's reindeer. Following dinner and some football watching, we started our Christmas Eve program of lighting candles, reading the Christmas story and singing songs. It was a lesson in patience and lowering expectations for Jay and I as we were the only ones participating. Henry wanted to crawl into the fire...

Seth on defense

tip over the tree...

Sammy on defense

and eat the cookies left out for Santa. Christmas Eve has always been my favorite part of the entire holidays, when family gathers and faces glow with twinkle lights.

Sammy was using Jay's scriptures to sing songs. Whatever works.

Jay and I sitting by the fire

I was a tad disappointed with the outcome but took comfort by reminding myself how young my children are and how much I'll enjoy these chaotic memories in years to come.

Attempt number 1 for our annual Christmas Eve ornament picture

Attempt #2

After about five more attempts, we just took out the problem:)

I hadn't wrapped any of my presents so spent the two hours after the boys went to bed doing that. Then I cleaned up the house so it wasn't a disaster before the real disaster started. Love being an adult! Woo hoo!

Christmas Day

Henry is ready to get the party started!

Henry had a rough night and woke up twice during the night. He was legitimately sick so he got out of bed both times for some medicine and soothing snuggles. Seth and Sam came downstairs at 6:45 and seemed perfectly content waiting to open their presents. I've mentioned before how odd Seth can be and he suggested we hold off until evening to open the presents and spend the day "singing Christmas songs, talking about Jesus...." Admirable but no. We asked him if he had looked if Santa had come and he thought he had because he saw a tennis racket. That got Sammy's attention and we all quickly went upstairs to discover what was in everybodys' stockings. Seth's dreams came true and spent the rest of the day being a Denver Bronco.

Checking out his new bronco calendar

All about the Broncos

Completely content

He wanted to make sure we had a picture of his jersey...

The pose

Again

Playing with new Star Wars Transformers

Opening up Grandma and Grandpa Johnson's present

Sammy was happy and went from toy to toy to toy all day (always conveniently leaving whatever he was already playing with out) and Henry could have cared less about it all. He slept in until 8:30 and all he wanted to do was go up the stairs, play with the paper or get in the fire.

Cleaning up Santa's left over cookies.

Cookie Monster

Henry's obstacle course.

I can't say this is my favorite age. He sure is cute but busy.

Henry's one new toy. That's all he needed.

Jay checks out his new office calendar

We had hot chocolate and toast for breakfast and leftover chili for lunch. The day was nice playing with new toys and games and football outside.

Jay running a perfect play

Seth setting up the perfect play...I think it was called "Dippity Do Dah"

Running in a touchdown

Avoiding the linebacker snowman

Future Quarterback

Again, I felt a bit lonesome for family and the festivity that comes with numbers. After cleaning the kitchen for what seemed like the 20th time that day and trying to get the living room back in order, I longed for more distractions. Cousins for my boys to play with, moms, someone to be in the kitchen with me while I made cheesy potatoes and green bean casserole. I didn't get to talk to my parents in Myanmar because of the weird time difference. It's like 14 hours (I think) and whenever I thought of it, it was an impossible time to call. We talked to most everyone in our family on the phone and it sounds like everyone had nice days.

Once the boys were in bed, Jay hooked up my new Video Karaoke System

Yikes...get that girl some makeup!

and we spent the next two hours rocking out. We had so much fun with just the two of us and both commented on how fun it would be with more. After each song, it gives you a score for your performance. After day one, Jay holds the record with a score of 95 singing Piano Man by Billy Joel. That'll be hard to beat but I have many more hours at home than he does. There is no shame in singing alone in the middle of the afternoon. No shame at all.

Singing "Queen of Hearts" of which I got a dismal score of 65.

There is a contest program that comes with the system. It chooses three songs for each "team" at random. I got three songs I've never heard of. One of Jay's "random" songs was piano man! This was after he had already scored the 95! He won and currently reigns as karaoke champ. Because he is the champ, I thought I'd share his Karaoke skills with all of you. We can all learn something from his exquisite technique. (As a disclaimer, he was aware that I had a camera in my hand:))




That's what's been going on in our neck of the woods. Jay is off again today and we are really having a nice day. Not doing much but the rest of the week looks busier so I'm going to enjoy the slow tempo.