Christmas Eve and Christmas

On Christmas eve, we continued my family's tradition of reading a special arrangement of the Christmas story, which combines excerpts from the scriptures and Christmas hymns and other songs. 

Jack ended up arranging our Little People Nativity while listening to the Christmas story, which was fine with me.  But then Eliza was upset about something.  I don't remember what it was exactly...?  But I thought I'd share, lest you think "all was calm" at our house that evening.

Then we continued our tradition of letting the children each open one gift.  (Though I'm considering changing this practice... they were so excited about opening a gift that they weren't as attentive during the Christmas story as I would have liked, plus, you'll see it ended up interfering with our sleep on Christmas morning.)  It so happened that they all chose to open the gifts they received from Grammy.  An art set for Cat, a cool flexible light-up racetrack with cars for Jack, and a pink big girl backpack for Eliza.  I don't remember when or why she decided to disrobe, but there you go.  Maybe she was overwhelmed with gratitude? ;-)  Thank you Grammy!

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After we got some cookies out for Santa and a few carrots and celery stalks for the reindeer, the kids went to bed.  They slept just fine until Jack woke up at 5:30 am.  And he wasn't awake because he was eager to open more presents; he woke up because he wanted to play with the race track he opened on Christmas Eve!  Oh my.  We were able to convince him to go back to bed, and we got a little more sleep before it was Time.   This is what the living room looked like when they kids came in, and how they responded.  Love it!

I helped Santa out by making a fabric sword for each kid's stocking.  They were a hit.

Eliza received a wooden doll bed from Santa, but was more excited about this little owl puppet that was in her stocking.  I think she's played more with the puppet than the doll bed in the weeks since Christmas, too.

Jack had fun with his present from Santa.  He'd been saying for weeks that he wanted "A BIG Thomas and Annie and Clarabel." I'm not sure what he was expecting when he said "BIG" but Santa found ended up bringing a big (little B) Thomas which follows the light of his lantern.  It's pretty fun to play with.

The kids loved their gifts from Mema and Papa - a set of homemade clothes for Cat's new Build-a-Bear, Snoflake; a fire engine with lights and a siren for Jack, and a singing Little People car for Eliza.  Thank you!

Shortly before Christmas, I asked Cat what she wanted to make for her Dad.  All by herself she said she wanted to make an art book, and it turned out great!  We chose a piece of art she'd done in the fall and laminated it (since it was done in oil pastel and would have been messy whenever someone touched it) for the cover.  She wrote on the lamination with permanent marker, then I sewed it with blank pages in the middle.  She then glued pieces of hers and Jack's and Eliza's art onto the pages.  I love that she came up with this meaningful gift all by herself.

We realized during the holiday season that Ben doesn't own a red tie.  What??  So Jack colored this tie for Ben to have, until we replace it with a real one.

 

A few more miscellaneous photos of kids and gifts:

Cat, with a set of colored pens that were included in her Story & Art Inspiration Kit. 

Play Dough from Pops.

Night vision binoculaurs from Pops.

When the gift opening was complete, we enjoyed homemade cinnamon rolls and warm wassail in Mugstaches.

Cat began working on her first major piece of art using her new easel, paper, paint, and paintbrushes as soon as she could.