We had a really wonderful Christmas day! It is always a good day, of course — minus the year that shall not be mentioned when we all had the flu — but this year felt extra special with my parents and brother here. I told Jose last night that maybe we should always try to have family here, or go where family is. It just makes me feel all warm and fuzzy.
Some notes! Christmas Eve:
- On Christmas Eve we decorated cookies with our neighbors and got to snuggle their 5-week-old.
- We went to church with my mom. This is rather monumental since we don’t go to church. But my mom wanted to go, and there’s a Presbyterian church less than a mile away, so we all joined her. It was nice!
- We had tamales for dinner as is our new/old tradition — new for me, but old for Jose. They were yummy! After dinner, we walked around the neighborhood admiring the lights.
- David, Jose and I spent nearly 2 hours assembling Charlotte’s play kitchen. Helping Santa is time-consuming work.
Christmas:
- The girls came running into our bedroom at 6:58 exclaiming that Santa had eaten the cookies they left and drank all the milk! Much excitement! They were thrilled to see what he had left. Since Santa left the play kitchen in the study, they needed a bit of help to find it.
- We opened stockings and saw all the things that Santa left the girls, and then paused for breakfast — egg sausage casserole and cinnamon rolls. Yum!
- We opened all the presents in haphazard fashion with Emma and Charlotte just pulling them out from under the tree and handing it to whoever it was for. I liked this method, as it prevented any real comparison of “so and so has 4 presents and I only have 3!”
- Notable presents included a photobook for my mom of photos from our big family summer vacation, an astrophotography computer thingy for Jose, and an espresso machine (!) for me. Plus the afore-mentioned play kitchen. And Emma got a Nintendo Switch, so there has been much Mario Karting.
- Dad, Jose, and I went for a nice walk around the pond in the new section of Exploration Green. When we got home, Jose and I took Emma on a bike around around the neighborhood loop.
- We had pot roast for dinner and played a holiday bingo game that my mom brought — with prizes!
Today has been a little quieter. Lots of enjoying Christmas gifts, eating treats, and art projects. David, Jose, and I went to see Star Wars this afternoon while Mom and Dad took the girls to the park.
All in all, the best Christmas yet!
p.s. I’m doing a 31 day blogging challenge.
