'Twas the night before Christmas

Well, it's officially here, Christmas Eve.  It's come SO quickly.  What a wonderful time of year for our family.  As I saw patients today, they asked if I had any children.  I, of course, offered that I have 2, a 5 year old boy and a 2 year old girl.  All of them immediately replied that I was in for a special treat.  I agree.  Tomorrow morning is going to be SPLENDID!

I can't even remember what's happened since my last blog post...finished shopping-even ordered something Tuesday evening and received it Thursday (amazing!) for a "little" extra money! :)  I wrapped tons of gifts and placed them under the tree.  Since I had to work today, we spent yesterday as a family, just the four of us.  We went to breakfast and returned home to spend a little extra time together.  We had a great time making Santa cookies.  We cut out the cookies with our many Christmas cookie cutters and decorated them with sprinkles and candies.  Eliza ate enough raw dough to equal 2 cookies.  We couldn't keep her out of it!  She also enjoyed using the pink sprinkles for the wise men, reindeer, stars and Christmas bells--"because pink's my favorite." Jackson couldn't wait for the cookies to come out of the oven and cool, so he could have a cooked cookie.  He decided he wasn't messing with that raw stuff.

Eliza making all the cookies pink

They're so proud of their Christmas cookies (notice all the pink sprinkles)

Last night, Charlie and I enjoyed watching National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation.  It's become a tradition of ours to sit down and watch it sometime during the Christmas season.  It gets funnier and funnier each year we see it.  Charlie's favorite is the squirrel part...if you've ever seen it, you know what I'm talking about.  I'm laughing just thinking about it.

This afternoon we had the family Christmas Eve service at church.  During this service, the children participate in the Christmas pageant, The First Christmas Ever.  It's super cute!  The children have one practice, the Sunday before the performance and are given their part in the play based on their age.  The play is "acted" out by the Christmas hymns the congregation sings.  It's wonderful to see so many children dresses as sheep, shepherds, angels, wise people, Mary and Joseph.  This year, Jackson graduated to a shepherd, as he is now in Kindergarten.  Eliza isn't quite old enough to participate, BUT next year, we'll have to pleasure of seeing her as a sheep.  That will be interesting!!

Jackson is a shepherd

After the church service, we all came back to our house (my parents and Charlie's parents included) and had dinner.  Such a nice time talking about Santa coming and visiting with each other until we get the children to bed.

Right before bed, we placed Santa's cookies and the reindeer's carrot chips on our Christmas plate.  Jackson, of course, noted that there were only 2 carrot chips on the plate, so he had to get six more so all 8 reindeer would have a carrot chip! He never stops thinking, especially of others--even at 5!  I'm so glad the reindeer will now have 8 carrots to consume! ;)

As I've moved the Barbie (sitting on the couch watching TV--naked, of course!) to sit on the sofa, I quickly type a blog entry. A Christmas movie plays in the background, we wait for the house to get quiet.  Eliza told me after I read her a story, sang her two songs and went to the potty 2 more times, that we "better get in bed cuz Santa comes tonight."  I think Charlie and I are more excited to see our children's eyes tomorrow morning when they wake up to see what Santa has left.  I cherish these moments, as I know they are VERY short-lived.

Christmas 2010: Our family on Christmas Eve

 Merry Christmas to all, and to all, a good night!!

The Mother Load

Wow!  What a day....  We are, once again, in Asheboro.  Rather than celebrating Thanksgiving, we are celebrating Christmas.  Even though we are celebrating a much different holiday, we still have so much for which to be thankful!! 

We arrived yesterday and luckily, did not encounter any of the treacherous roadways.  We really did not see much inclement weather until we arrived to Randolph County.  There was some leftover ice on the trees.  The Lee's driveway was a little slick, but we managed.  For those of you who know what the Lee's driveway is like, it really wasn't slick until you were by the door.

Today, we lounged around and decided to lay low in the morning.  We ran to the mall for the kids to look at books and play a couple arcade games...Jackson LOVES the arcade games!  My children's favorite part of the day:  this afternoon when we unloaded the MOTHER LOAD!!  There were SO many presents under the tree, it took us several minutes to "unload" the tree.  Jackson and Eliza did an excellent job putting every one's gifts into piles...and both had a slightly (OK, hugely) larger smile when the present in their small hands ended up in their pile.  We opened and opened and opened some more! 

"Eliza, where are you?!"

Jackson poses by his presents

After dinner, Charlie, Jackson, Eliza and I enjoyed playing with the Light Bright Jackson received.  We talked about how Charlie and I had one when we were little and how much fun it was.  Jackson and Charlie worked on a snail, and Eliza and I worked on a kitty.  Light Brights may have changed, but we still had the same ol' kinda fun! 

Family fun

Jackson's finished product.  How fun!

Eliza had fun, this year and last, prancing around with my new purse.  Last year, I received a zebra print purse (which embarrassingly, I'm still carrying!).  This year, I received a gold, very gaudy (my philosophy: the gaudier, the better) purse, that Eliza liked to prance in.  This year she added a very cool scarf I got. 

Christmas 2009: Eliza playing with mommy's new purse.



Christmas 2010: Eliza prancing....



Jackson informed Charlie and I tonight that his Star Wars gifts were the best he received.  He got 3 (yes, three) Star Wars transformers and 2 different Star Wars Legos.  He and Charlie enjoyed transforming the transformers and building with the Legos.  A proud mom moment: when Jackson sat down at the kitchen table, pulled out his Legos and stated, "OK, first we have to organize!"  Yep, he is his mother's child!  Now if only the Legos came with a small rubbermaid for storage?!?!

Jackson opening one, of his 3, Star Wars transformers.

This is Tatum's first Christmas experience.  She was with us last year, but she was only a week old.  I remember that she sat mostly in her animal bouncy seat....well, actually, Eliza enjoyed sitting in her bouncy seat.  As you can imagine, Eliza was much too big to fit in her bouncy seat.   This year, Eliza enjoyed playing with some of Tatum's toys.  After Eliza had opened all her presents, she moved over to Tatum and played with Tatum's new instruments (with Tatum's permission, of course). 

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Christmas 2009: Eliza having fun playing in Tatum's bouncy seat

Christmas 2010: Eliza playing with Tatum's instruments.

In trying to teach my children that not every grandchild is able to get all these presents for Christmas, I stop and listen to what I'm telling my children.  We don't deserve any of this, but we are very lucky to have it!  We are such a blessed family!!!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas.....

What a week it has been....  Let's start from last week's blog. 

We visited Enchanted Airlie last Saturday night.  This is the first time our family visited Airlie during the Christmas holidays.  It was VERY cold, but worth the walk in the cold to see the lego display (which contained Star Wars characters), butterflies and beautiful lights.  We didn't wait to see Santa, as there was a long line, and we knew we would be visiting later in the week.  



Jackson in front of the Lego town.





The butterfly room was Eliza's favorite part at Airle.



Sunday was the annual Advent Festival at church.  We made our gingerbread houses, advent wreath, oranaments, bead candycanes, hand-print Christmas trees and countdown to Christmas chain.  We had a great fun with great friends!



Eliza concentrating on her gingerbread house.



So tempting to eat the icing "glue."

Eliza's finished product.  So proud!!

 Wednesday we visited Santa at Mayfaire.  Eliza didn't want to get close to Santa at first, but from the door told Santa that she wanted a Mickey Mouse.  This is the first Charlie and I heard about this....  Jackson was excited to sit on Santa's lamp.  He told Santa he wanted a Star Wars transformer, Maze Book, Woody, Buzz, Slinky and Jessie Toy Story characters.  Once Eliza saw Jackson sitting on Santa's lap, she decided she would get closer, but not too close... 


Eliza: "This is close enough."

We stayed for the "snow" at Mayfaire.  Supposedly, there are 2 snow blowers on the roof of two restaurants by the theater....Charlie and I were a little (and by  "a little", I mean VERY) disappointed.  The kids loved running around...maybe because it's been so cold, and they haven't been able to run around outside.  After running around in the "snow", we had a nice dinner out. 



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Running around in the "snow"



Eliza eating a cookie at dinner

The weekend has returned, and here's to making more memories next week!

A couple more "Ho, Ho, Ho" pictures to enjoy.... 



He looks happy, huh?



And then there's Eliza.... 



Decorations....at any cost

We arrived home from our wonderful Thanksgiving weekend and hit the (Wilmington) ground running!  We got home, unpacked and jumped back into the car to get our Christmas tree.  We knew we would all be home Tuesday to decorate the tree. We wanted to get it, so it would have a chance to sit in the stand before decorating. 

"This is the PERFECT tree!!!"

Our family 2010



Tuesday afternoon we decorated our 2010 Christmas tree.  Each year, Charlie and I reminisce about our first married Christmas together.  We decorated our first tree as a married couple...we were so proud of it!  Even got it at Lowe's!  We sat down to a piping hot bowl of chili and bam!...tree hit Charlie right square in the back.  Nine years later, we're putting up a Christmas tree (in a different, much larger home) with our two, beautiful, healthy children.  Amazing... 

I digress...  Charlie wanted to get some of the lights hung on the house Tuesday afternoon as well.  We (really, he, because I don't have a part in the light-hanging on the house) was having trouble getting the lights to stay on the A-frame roof of our house.  So...he comes inside with a "I think I figured it out!"  And he did....



"Are you crazy?!" his loving wife exclaimed. 

Eliza and I did some Christmas shopping on Thursday together, which ended in a lovely, mother/daughter meal at the none other, Chick-fil-a. 

We're all ready for a nice Saturday together.  We're planning on finishing up the lights and decorations outside and inside.  I've heard we might have some snow flurries in Wilmington Sunday morning...we shall see.... 

I have to include a couple more pictures.  Anyone that knows me well, knows that not only is our house decorated from Halloween to Easter, but so are our children.  Here are a couple more pictures to enjoy....



Annual Christmas jammies





They DO love each other!!