Home With Mommy: Christmas

Christmas:

On Christmas Eve we visited my parent's to see Aunt Sonny and my Uncle Len (her father). After that we went to the annual party at my In-Laws. There were a lot of people there including Josh's cousin and his family. That includes his 5 year old son and his 3 year old son. Ironically, the 3 year old just wanted to play with his mother's ipad (and wasn't happy that he couldn't) while the 5 year old had fun with Zach. They were so cute watching tv while eating with their plates in their laps.

We had my parent's over on Christmas morning like we did for Zach's first Christmas. That first Christmas I made "Egg McSchroeders" basically a homemade Egg McMuffin (Mc Donalds for proper citation). Josh's mom made it every Christmas morning when he was a kid. That year my parents, brother, and Aunt Sonny came to see Zach open his gifts.

Last year, my brother wasn't interested so we skipped it. This year, he has his own apartment. My mom was hosting dinner that night so she liked the idea of not having to worry about breakfast and they both LOVED the idea of seeing a kid on Christmas morning. We didn't wait for them to open the presents then I got to work making a lot of blueberry pancakes. Zach loved showing them what Santa brought.

He loved putting out the cookies on Christmas Eve. I set it up a half hour before bed for him but put them out of his reach so he could think about Santa eating them as we talked about Santa and his Reindeer. The minute before bed, we moved them to the coffee table. He double checked where they were.

Ironically, I was the first person awake at 8. Yes, I will always become a kid come Christmas morning. I made enough noise to wake the boys since my parent's were coming at 9. The first thing Zach did was check the cookies and saw they were eaten by "Santa" (Daddy, Josh made sure to make it look just right). He loved every gift. He forgot to open his stocking though so when we woke him up from his nap to get ready to go to my parent's house we had it for him. He opened Aunt Lisa's and Aunt Sonny's on Christmas Eve during the day (to make it less overwhelming) and some of ours, Uncle Hugh's and the Grandparent's (and Josh's Aunts and Uncle) on Christmas Day.

We celebrate the 12 days (Epiphany when the wise men were heading to Bethlehem to see Baby Jesus) so from the 26th to the 6th we do one present a day. It spreads out the celebration and makes it less overwhelming. My parents started this with me as a baby. He's getting clothing he needs from us since I knew family would follow the guidelines and get the toys that he'll love and won't drive Mommy crazy.

There was one impulse toy from Aunt Lisa that he is already too big for but we'll donate it to the Y so it's a way to be charitable. His toys mostly were Little People but he got duplo blocks he loves, a 'Cooking with Cookie Monster" play dough kit (from Uncle Hugh) which he also loves and a really cool Little Tykes tool bench from my parents. That is his favorite! Josh's Aunt and Uncle gave him a puzzle we originally didn't think we had a place for but it is now on the coffee table being taken apart. He's learning how puzzles work.