Christmas Day 08

Merry Christmas!!
I am cramming it all into one post!! We kept it pretty low key this year and it was very refreshing! We started off Christmas Eve Day with making sugar cookies. It was great fun! The girls had such a blast, I will let the pictures speak for themselves!
We went to a local Episcopal Church for Christmas Eve service with a pagent. It was great to experience a liturgical service like the ones i was used to growing up, and Annelise and Olivia were enthralled with the children acting out the story!! And Of course they were thrilled to wear their gorgeous christmas dresses that Daddy bought for them. Dont they look gorgeous! Julia's outfit was given to me by a postal worker when I was mailing our Chrisatmas cards! She had been watching for a baby girl Julia's size to give the outfit to, isnt that amazing! I love how the Lord provides for even the little things!!!

Daddy Fox posting here!

On Christmas Eve, after trying to get the girls to go to sleep forever. Annelise woke up about 11PM and said to Steph, "Mommy, the first thing I am going to do I when I wake up on Christmas morning, is run in to see... ( Steph just knew she was going to say 'what Santa brought me') if Baby Jesus is in the manger." That was refreshing! (Steph here: It was just what I needed cause I had a little pit in my stomach when Annelise spent so much time making sure the cookies and carrots were just right for Santa! Does anyone else feel this way! I mean Santa isn't real!! Jesus IS!!!)

Although we chose to produce a light Christmas this year, my mother and brother blew in to town with a car full of gifts, and bought the girls a trampoline!! Yes, so for the first time ever on Christmas Eve, I spent it outside in the cold and dark, other than the floodlight, putting together a trampoline, which by the way, had way WAY more steps and parts than the one we had growing up!In the morning, as tradition, we came to the tree in the front room that has the manger under it, the girls were very excited to see that baby Jesus had arrived. (we keep him hidden until Christmas morning) We read the Christmas Story, this year only once. Last year we read it 5 times before we got to the presents. Then they wanted to see if Santa put anything in their stockings.

Here are the girls discovering that the cookies had been eaten and the carrots are gone!!

Now I have to say on this note that we already told Annelise the Santa was a real person in history and he did give children toys and so on, but he died as all men do, and now people just pretend that he is real and give gifts in his name etc etc, but that the real story about Christmas is Jesus. Well, she decided that she would believe in Santa anyway! Funny.
So our main gift this year, a kitchen, we bought on craigslist. We actually already had a wood kitchen that we bought from our neighbors behind us at their garage sale. The girls wanted a plastic kitchen like the one they have at the church. So we sold the wooden kitchen on craigslist for more than we paid for it and bought this plastic one which is almost brand new on craigslist.

Well our big gift was trumped by the trampoline of course. We asked the girls if they wanted to take MeeMaw out to get the eggs from the chickens and she walked out and didn't even notice it at first until she had almost walked all the way past it. Then it was surprise, shock, awe, and lets play!!! Thanks Uncle J and MeeMaw for the trampoline. We love the gift of being active!

It turned out to be a great day. My ham was good, the pies were good, everything turned out well and it was a beautiful day, actually maybe even a little on the hot side. It was a great Christmas! Merry Christmas Everyone and Happy New Year!!!!!!

A's Birthday... I know. I am late!!

Well, "A" is now 5 years old and I just can not believe it!! She is so big and has been so excited for her birthday to come AND she is thrilled that it is close to Christmas. She loves the story of Baby Jesus and Mary and Joseph. She loves to be Mary with a baby in her tummy and to rock baby Jesus. She could play the nativity all day long. SO, she asked to have a Nativity Birthday! So our guests were invited to come dressed as their favorite Nativity Character. Of course sinse no boys were able to attend we had a bunch of Marys with their own baby Jesus's!

We read the christmas story which most of the girls knew by heart and I think they were frankly a little bored.

Kevin took the children on "donkey rides" in the wagon with a donkey head taped on!

Then we followed the star (little hints written on stars that led them thru the house and into the Kitchen) to the Baby Jesus cake.It was very low key and I was so glad! Although Annelise told me "Mommy, We never acted out the Nativity story!!" I told her it was 'cause we had all Mary's!

Annelise is my Beautiful, Intuitive, High Needs, High Empathy Daughter who I am so proud to parent! Happy Birthday My First Born!!!Thank you Lord for entrusting her to me!

My Little Busy Body

Well those of you who know our family know that Olivia is my little busy body. Once she was able to crawl I would find her all over the house. It was quite a shock to my system sinse Annelise was always attatched to my hip, and would cry outside the shower curtain for me until she was at least three... But Olivia has never lacked in the area of adventure! Once she was 16 months old she'd climb the playground equipment with the big kiddos. She has climbed to the top of our upright piano, to the top of our counter height table (naked no less, digging through my purse). She climbed up to the spice cabinet while dinner was simmering (AAK!! heart attack!) and a million other stories! And for the record, most of these things happened in the 2 minutes I was putting away laundry or going to the restroom; I do supervise my children!!! The thing is, she is as sweet as pie. She always says "no thank you" and "yes. please" and gives kisses for no reason. She throws fits, but what 2 year old doesn't? But the latest Olivia spree is wearing me out! She has started marking. Marking the door jams, the cement floor, the pretty sewing desk kevin bought for my sewing closet, tables, chairs. Spanking don't scare her. Timeouts are effective for the afternoon, but forgottent he next day. I guess she has my artistic streak! But her latest marking episode was too much! I wish I had taken a picture, but I was too dumbfounded! Yes folks, she marked the baby. There were scribble marks on the balnket all around her head and one strong green mark on top of Julia's pretty little head. I knew I had something to fear when she was hiding as I walked in... But I couldnt help but laugh! I mean come on!... the baby!!!