Happy 2nd Day of Christmas

The past few days have been too busy to write but now that Christmas is over and grownups are relaxing while kids are busy playing with their toys it's time to catch up.

Christmas Eve we had our traditional dinner - Honey Baked Ham with potatoes au gratin, and green beans with bacon vinaigrette. This year I also got a side of sweet potato casserole from Honey Baked Ham since Little Man liked it so much at Thanksgiving. Dessert is Swedish Apple Pie with vanilla ice cream. It's one of the few days out of the year that we eat in the dining room and bring out the fancy stuff - china, crystal, silver etc.

After dinner the kids changed in to their new Christmas pjs and my husband read Twas the Night Before Christmas and then we sent them all to bed. I prepped the French Toast Casserole for the following morning and while we waited for the kids to fall alseep. It took a while before the kids finally fell asleep and we could put the last of the gifts out, and get to bed ourselves.

Christmas morning my in-laws woke up before the kids. Not because they are super early risers, but because they kids were asleep til 8am!!! They actually didn't get out of bed until my husband and I opened their doors. It took us about 4 hours to open all the gifts (with a brief break for breakfast). The kids were all very happy with their gifts - tons of Lego stuff for everyone, and Star Wars stuff for Little Man. Our daughters both got cameras from Santa and have been having a great time taking pictures and videos of everything. This will be our most documented Christmas ever - thank God for digital cameras or we'd be spending a fortune in film :)


Since we've had hardly any snow this year my father-in-law's one wish was to have a White Christmas. Sure enough it started snowing mid-morning. It was the perfect amount, just enough to make it pretty, but not so much that we had to get out the snow blower. We took the kids out for a while to get some fresh air and have a snow ball fight.

The adults got good stuff too, I gave my husband AppleTV - we're finally joining the 21st century, and he got me a new iPad with keyboard which will back blogging much easier. But my favorite gifts as always were the crafty ones from the kids.

Little Reader painted this in art class. 

Little Hugger made this handprint ornament

Little Man made this handprint wreath.

Midafternoon we had a snack of aebleskiver and glogg, and I used the ham bone from the Honey Baked Ham to make split pea soup for dinner. 

Today I am slowly taking my time getting the house back to relative tidyness.  Dinner tonight is going to be very easy - Sloppy Joes.  I've done enough cooking and baking in the past couple of days I need a break.

Christmas Card Display

One of my favorite parts about Christmas is getting cards from everyone. Even though I am more up to date with friends lives due to Facebook I still enjoy seeing pictures of everyone's kids. We don't send a newsletter but I enjoy most of those too - as long as they are not 8 pt single space chronicling every detail of that family's life that year. Feel free to brag, but let's stick to the highlights please.

For a while I put the cards in a little bin as we received them and even though it was a cute Christmasy bin, the cards were quickly forgotten. So a couple of years ago I bought some red velvet ribbon which I attach to the doorway between our living room and front hallway.If we get a lot of cards I also run one along the top of the doorway connecting the two, but I feel like people aren't sending as many cards as they used to.

I use clothespins to attach the cards but to make it more fun I had the kids paint them in Christmas colors. They were 5 and 3 at the time, and now want to repaint them as they think they can do better now that they are 3 years older, but I won't let them. I kind of like their imperfection.

Holiday Sing

This past Wednesday Little Man had his school's holiday sing. He was very excited and knew his songs well. Wednesdays are always logistically tough as my daughters have piano lessons after school. So after Little Reader's lesson I dropped her off at Little Man's school to save seats and then headed back to pick Little Hugger up from her lesson. Little Reader was all excited as she felt like a big kid being trusted with a big responsibility.

We got seats almost in the front row so Little Man found us in the audience right when he got on stage and gave us a big smile and a wave. His class sang one song "Wrap It Up" a song about the elves getting the toys ready for the sleigh. I'd never heard it before but it was cute.

After a couple of other classes sang, all the kids came on stage for a finale. Silent Night, Jingle Bells, and We Wish You A Merry Christmas. Everything went well for the first song and then right in the middle of Jingle Bells the boy next to him started crying. Big sobs, so Little Man stopped singing and was staring at the kid, who then tried to push Little Man's face to face front. He kept staring at him for a while and then faced front again. As soon as the song was over the teachers got the boy off stage and brought him back stage.

After the show I asked Little Man what had happened and as I suspected the poor kid had wet himself.

The school had arranged for Santa to come and see the children but since we had already seen him we skipped that part and went out to eat instead.

Christmas Lights

Along with the traditions of decorating the tree, baking cookies and doing crafts with my kids, I have always enjoyed seeking out the over the top house.  Here is a video of this years' find.  I was in Target buying lights for our bushes when an employee came up and started talking to me about lights.  This is her house.

Unlike a lot of other houses where the lights are on a timer and you never see the owners, this family comes out and greets everyone and hands out candy canes.

In case you're wondering, they have over 18,000 lights and it takes them 17 days to set it all up.

Christmas Card Pictures

I love decorating our house for Christmas. We have a lot of decorations collected from various travels over the years, and while they are all Christmas themed they still remind me of the places they are from and the things we did there. I'm always a little sad to put it all away at the end of the season.

My favorite Christmas decorations are not ornaments though, they are our Christmas card pictures. A few years ago I saw this idea (I think in Parents magazine) suggesting that each year you frame the picture you use for your Christmas card and put it out with your Christmas decorations. After Christmas you pack them up with the rest of the decorations. The reason to pack them away is that while I have lots of other framed photos around our house, I hardly ever really look at them. I see them, I know they are there, but I hardly ever take the time to look at them.

We now have a collection of nine pictures of our kids growing up through the years. I love unpacking them every year and seeing how much they've changed. I purposely get a different frame each year to take the pressure off of finding a match the following year (or having a huge stockpile).

Here are a few of my favorites through the years.... 

Little Reader as a baby - she's now 8

Little Reader (4 yo) and Little Hugger (2yo)

All 3

2 years ago

Getting into the Christmas Spirit

Today was a busy but fun day. I don't think we could have crammed more Christmas activities in if we'd tried.

This morning we got the kids all dressed up and went to a Santa brunch at Makray Golf Club in Barrington. It's a public course so the brunch is open to everyone. It's reasonably priced, they have a professional photographer there and let you take your own pictures (the one on the right was the one I took, not quite card worthy but still cute). They email you their picture so you can use it however you want.  The one weird thing though was that when my kids started to tell Santa what they wanted he told them to write him a letter instead.  I guess because they do take their time with the pictures, they don't have time for the actually telling about wishes.

After we were done eating we all changed into warmer clothes and headed out to cut down our Christmas tree for the first time ever.  A friend of mine had recommended Oney's Tree Farm in Woodstock IL so that's where we headed. The weather wasn't that great. It was raining most of the ride there but by the time we arrived it was just misting and eventually stopped.

There is a little store and bakery right by the entrance but we skipped that and headed straight for the trees. You can bring your own saw or borrow one of their's (with a $20 deposit that is returned when you bring back the saw). There is a horse drawn wagon that brings you to the middle of the field and you just wander around among the trees until you find one you like. In the past we've usually gotten Fraser Firs but at this farm (and maybe it's this way at all of them), they are all mixed together which made finding the right tree a little trickier but still fun.  Little Man loved looking at all the little trees, especially the ones smaller than him.

It was extremely muddy after the rain, but the kids had fun with that ;). When we finally found our tree we were a little further and downhill from the wagon stop than the entrance so we walked back. Pretty tricky with a nine foot tree in the mud, but we made it back.

The farm workers shook our tree (to get any critters out). The kids thought that part was hysterical, and they bailed it for us and helped my husband get it onto our car. Note, they only lift it on the car, you are responsible for tying it down.

We stopped in the store to pay and have some cocoa, before heading back home. It took us a little over an hour to get back, but part of that was I didn't want to be barreling down 90 at my usual clip in case the tree did come loose - which it didn't.

We got it into our house really easily since it was bailed, and are letting it settle in a bit before we decorate it. Ok, ok, it settled in pretty quickly since it was so fresh, we were just too tired to do it.

After dinner we decided to keep the Christmas theme going and we all sat down to watch Charlie Brown's Christmas. It's fun to watch Christmas movies with the kids cause my daughters now know them well and often giggle in anticipation of the funny lines, while Little Man is really only appreciating them this year.

Nyhavn in the snow

We all slept very well after a fun but Christmas packed day. The only things missing were the Christmas cookies (I'm catching up on those today) and the fact that we still haven't had any snow. I read in the paper that if we didn't have any measurable snow today - we didn't - it would set a record for longest gap of snowy days for Chicago - 282 I think the number was. It makes it a little harder to get in the Christmas spirit without snow, but thankfully my friends and family in Denmark have been posting some gorgeous snowscapes on Facebook so at least I can enjoy their snow.

The view from my aunt's apartment

Lights

It may not have felt like December today, but at least it was warm enough for my husband to finish putting the lights up in front of our house.

Kicking off December

As I mentioned yesterday my husband and daughters went to the tree lot to sell trees last night. They left around 630 and figured they'd stay an hour. They ended up coming home after 9pm. They had sold a lot of trees and the kids mostly ran around with their friends and made s'mores. They came home sticky with tree sap and marshmallows and some pine fronds and cones that had fallen off some of the wreaths, and definitely in the Christmas spirit.

After they went to bed I did some Christmas shopping on-line and finished organizing all my pre-Christmas gifts.

The kids were all excited this morning to go down and check their stockings for the first Pre-Christmas gift. As has become the tradition for the first day, they each got a Christmas calendar. I just get a paper one with pictures as my parents usually send the chocolate ones. Those haven't arrived yet but I'm sure the kids won't mind catching up when they do arrive ;)

This morning I hung our wreath, and we are going to our first Christmas party this afternoon - our neighbor's annual open house. Part way through the party I have to take Little Reader to a birthday party. After that my husband and I are going out with some friends and then we have a holiday brunch tomorrow.

A busy weekend but fun.

Christmas Is Coming

Christmas is my favorite time of year. While I get annoyed when stores decorate and play Christmas music before Thanksgiving (or even Halloween), once Thanksgiving has passed it's time to celebrate the Christmas season. And to me it really is a season not a day. It's about the feeling of being with family and friends. It's about all that winter time nesting, staying in and working on crafts and baking because it's too cold to go outside.

My husband put up all some of our outdoor lights this past weekend, and plans on finishing this weekend. Yesterday my kids and I decorated our house. Here's one of my little helpers. Our decorations are a mix of store bought and stuff that the kids have created over the years.

We get a real tree so will wait on that for another couple of weeks, although my husband and daughters will be selling trees at our local tree lot tomorrow along with other members of their Indian Princess tribe.

 Stockings are all hung up ready for my modified advent calendar tradition to start on the 1st. More on that in a future post.

I'm looking forward to starting baking this weekend, just have to figure out what the first batch is going to be. I've found so many great recipes on Pinterest recently I'm a little overwhelmed.

Over the next few weeks my posts will mostly be about Christmas - favorite traditions, crafts, recipes etc. If you love Christmas as much as I do, follow along, and share your favorites too.

Slacker Blogger

OK, I admit it.  I've been a totally slacker blogger the past week or so, but on the upside I've been extremely productive in every other aspect of life.  So what have I been doing?  Mostly getting ready for my favorite time of year.  Usually I get pretty stressed out this time of year as money has been tight at this point the past couple of years.  This year we're in a much better place as my husband already got his Christmas bonus instead of having to wait til mid December.  I'm trying hard not to go overboard. Most of the money we plan on using to pay down debt, but it's nice to have flexibility and not have to charge everything like I did last year.  I can't remember the last time I had already started Christmas shopping in November.

To get ready for cold weather and the holidays I've sewn the flannel comforter cover for Little Reader.  I've been doing some serious cleaning to help get ready for our parents to come visit for the holidays so I don't have to spend the final weekend before they arrive doing nothing but cleaning.

My kids get a little present in their stocking everyday until Christmas starting on December 1st.  I try to buy a bunch all of the stuff before the month starts to minimize the stress, and as soon as I finish this post I need to organize the stuff and see how much more I need to buy.

Trip downtown

The kids are off of school all week this week, so I decided to use yesterday as the day to get their passports.  The weather was good, so we took the L to get downtown which was much easier (and cheaper) than parking, and felt like an adventure to them as we hardly ever do it.

Our consulate is in the Hancock building which the kids got excited about, to get to go a building they've walked by many times but never been inside.  They got kind of antsy during our meeting at the consulate but I told them if they behaved I'd show them something special in the basement. That helped get them settled down for a little bit.

Finally we were done with the paperwork and headed downstairs. They have an elaborate and FREE train setup in the lower level. It really was quite impressive and the kids loved it.  We probably spent 20 minutes there looking at all the details.

We went to M Burger in Water Tower for lunch. It's a Lettuce Entertain You place, but fast food style. We got basic plain cheeseburgers (because that's what we wanted, you can make them more interesting) and fries. They were pretty decent for the price and speed. It's not Blackies, but definitely a step up from the usual chains which I avoid at all costs.

Since we were in Water Tower we stopped at the Lego store and American Girl. Little Reader spent a lot of time studying the different dolls to figure out which one she wants. She's leaning towards 57, but wants to go on line to see of they have something better. I could tell Little Hugger was starting to get interested in them too but luckily as soon as Little Reader pointed out that they were for 8 year old + she stopped and focused on their little pets. Thank God. Bad enough that I'll have to get one, I did not want to get two. The worst part is that this $105 doll is dressed but it's a pretty lame outfit, basically forcing you to buy an outfit as well (another $30). I tried to impress all this upon her today, that if Santa is so generous as to bring her one, she's may have to purchase future outfits accessories using her own money. Once she saw the grand piano for the doll and saw that it cost $150 she understood ;)

I still needed to get the title transferred to the car we refinanced, so we hopped on the bus and headed down to the Loop to the Thompson Building. I let them play at the Dubuffet for a little bit hoping to get the wiggles out before dealing with the DMV.

They thought the building was really cool but got bored pretty fast at the DMV. Luckily we got through there relatively quickly.

Kids wanted another snack before getting back on the train to head home. We picked up some drinks, cheeses rocks and grapes at Walgreens and sat in a little courtyard between some of the buildings. Quick stop at the Renaissance hotel to use the washroom before getting back in the Red Line home.

All in all a good day. I got the things done that I needed to do and the kids had fun. On the way home I noticed a FB comment from a friend about a gingerbread display at the Marriott on Michigan Avenue. Oh well, we'll have to save that for next time.

American Girl

My daughters are 8 and 6 and thankfully have shown no interest in American Girl dolls. They've been to a birthday party there (they brought their teddy bears). Little Reader likes the books, and until now that was it, and that was just fine with me. I never liked dolls growing up, I preferred my snuggle buddies as we call them in our house. My daughters seemed to be following my lead until I asked them to write up their Christmas wish lists.

Little Reader wants an American Girl doll that looks like her. She specifically said she's going to ask Santa for it as I had mentioned before that they are pretty expensive.

Here's the problem. So far it's her only Santa wish, and if she had shown interest in dolls in the past I wouldn't think twice about it, as she does take good care of her things. The problem is I really don't think she'll play with it that much. I also know her well enough that if I push that opinion she'll say even more that she wants it. Also I know that like me she thinks about things a lot before she verbalizes them, so has pretty much made up her mind.

So, what's my plan? Well as luck would have it, between her and her sister they have 3 birthday parties coming up. Today we're going shopping for the gift for the first one. Normally I go to Target but today I plan on taking them to Toys R Us. My hope is that she'll see something else and will change her mind about the AG doll. Wish me luck.

November Goals

1. Buy all advent calendar stuff.  24 days x 3 kids is a lot of stuff.  I like to have it all bought before Dec 1 so I can plan what to give when.  I may need to make a printable to keep it all straight ; )

2. Plan Christmas gift shopping and budget.  My Santa app is a big help, I just wish it had a bar code scanner.

3. Keep running.  3 miles 2-3 times a week should be doable. No more long runs, I'll start that up again when the weather gets better.

4. Give the house a good deep cleaning.  We have both sets of parents coming in over the holidays and ideally if I pick one task a day of deep cleaning, then the pre guest cleaning won't be so bad.  I've got a bunch of printables from other sites, just need to start using them.

5. Make curtain for laundry area.  The sliding doors have finally annoyed me so much that I removed them, which makes the space easier to access, but it's an eyesore.

6. Sew flannel duvet cover for Little Hugger.

7. Get passports for the kids

Pinning Success

Awhile back I found a pin for a gift wrap organizer using an upended stool and sewing an organizer for the outside. Didn't seem too hard, (here's the link if you want to try it) but I kept putting off the project. Now that we're getting closer to the holidays I started thinking about it again.




 Then I came across a link to a Martha Stewart pin that was much easier, cheaper, and to my son's delight required a trip to Home Depot :)

A paint bucket $3.98 plus a Husky tool caddy $6.98. Done. The pin suggests a tension rod for ribbons but I skipped that as we don't use a lot of ribbon. I am thinking of adding one though to help separate the wrapping paper. The rolls do flop around a little even though I put them on either side of the handle.  My tool caddy has a ton more pockets probably cause it's meant for regular hand tools and the Fiskars one on the left is meant for gardening tools.  I really like that it has lots of little pockets for different pens/pencils.




 Either way I like this so much better than my old tall Rubbermaid organizer. Stuff would get stuck at the bottom never to be seen again. Some rolls were to long to allow the lid to be on it. It has now been relegated to the garage as a new home for baseball bats and lacrosse sticks.

What are you doing to get ready for the holidays?

A Good Friday

Friday morning I dropped Little Man for his field trip to the pumpkin farm. He was so excited!! Maybe more excited to ride the big school bus than to actually go to the pumpkin farm. As we were waiting for everyone to arrive, I started to see that pretty much every kid was accompanied by their Mom. It wasn't required that parents chaperone but I was starting to feel a little bad that I hadn't volunteered. At the same time I knew that Little Man would be more independent and more likely to eat his lunch if I wasn't there. And this was going to be my only chance to go for a long run without any time pressure. He was perfectly happy to go off without me and soon enough has happily on his way.

I drove over to Busse Woods in Elk Grove Village planning to run their 7.7 mile trail. I had walked the whole thing years ago when Little Reader was still in a stroller. Today was much colder 48 when I arrived but with the leaves changing it was really pretty. At one point I misunderstood the trail markers and ended up going the wrong way. I thought the trail would join up with the main trail, but it never did so I had to turn around and go back the way I came. In the end I ran 9.3 miles (with .1 mi intervals of walking every .75 miles). I managed it in an hour an half. I checked the results from last year's Hot Chocolate and that's about average for my age group so I feel a lot more confident about the race, knowing I can do it.

I ran the whole thing in a sweatshirt and shorts and while I warmed up some as I ran I definitely need to get some cool weather running gear.

After stretching out and warming up I went to IKEA for lunch and to take advantage of being able to be there without kids. They already have their Christmas section set up and I saw the greatest little "why didn't anyone think of that before" item? Those silver ornament hangers have always bugged me, these green ones are great.  I don't know how well they work since I haven't used them yet - obviously - but I wanted to buy them now in case I don't make it back to IKEA before Christmas.  I love/hate that big blue box. 


I picked up Little Man and he had had a great time on his field trip. A lot of the kids had fallen asleep on the ride home and looked a little groggy. Little Man came off the bus with a huge smile on his face. He had a pumpkin and a caramel apple and was in a hurry to get home to eat his apple. He told me all about the different things they did, and proudly said that he ate his lunch. He managed to bite all the caramel off his apple and only eat a tiny bit of apple.


After school we took his sisters to drive around and Hobgoblin their friends. We've been doing it for about 3 years now and they love it. If you aren't familiar with the Hobgoblin it's kind of a Halloween Secret Santa. You drop off Halloween goodies at 6 friends houses and then they are supposed to pay it forward to six other people and the chain continues til Halloween. You post the sign in your window so people know you've been "booed". They had a lot of fun picking out goodies to put in our bags (vampire teeth, Halloween pencil and eraser, glow sticks, and a couple of pieces of candy). Since it's supposed to delivered secretly, I drove them around and they rang the bell and ran back to the car to try to get away before their friend saw them (which caused lots of giggles).

My husband made it home for dinner after having business dinners a couple of nights this week. Little Man enjoyed telling everyone about his field trip. He got the new iPhone and we were all having fun coming up with silly questions for Siri.

Ok, on the surface this may not seem like a post that would go with my theme, but really it was a good day of managing to provide fun times for each of the kids, a relaxing evening with my husband and still a good day for me. See? Balance.

October Goals

I've recently adopted a habit of setting goals for myself for the month and I have to say it is helping me stay on task, especially for the bigger stuff.  I'd be lying if I said I accomplished everything, but I'm getting more done.

So time to set October's goals
- Sew Comforter for Little Readers Build A Bear Bed
- Refinance Car
- Hot Chocolate Race Training - So far I've just been running for fun, but I've signed up for a 15K on November 4th, so need to do a little research on training and make sure I'm doing what I'm supposed to.  Also need to get some cooler weather running gear.
- Finish putting photo albums together. Gotta get caught up before the onslaught of holiday photos begins.
- Start planning Christmas shopping. Planning a budget, keep track of things kids ask for, etc.
- Organize and file away CDs. All our music is on iPods at this point, but my husband refuses to let me get rid of the actual CDs.  I just need a better way to store them than my current shopping bags.
- Weatherproof Little Man's room.  Poor guy has the only room with two original windows and bad insulation, it get's really cold in the winter.

There are a few broader goals that I'll be including in my 31 days series but the above is the main stuff.  I also intend to stay on top of my weekly projects as none of them are that tough this month. 

Post Christmas wrapup

Christmas has come and gone, overall it was good. It was quite a few crazy days trying to buy all the gifts once my husband's advance check cleared, but I managed to get it done. I didn't go very crazy, total cost for Christmas was a few hundred (I had used a gift budget app, but unfortunately my phone reset so I lost all the info). Cool app though, I'll have to find it again next year, it let's you list all the people you are buying gifts for, enter each gift and price and add it all up to keep you on budget. Also helped me track how many gifts I had for each kid. I realized quickly I had more for my son than my daughters, rather than buying more for them I just put some of his away until his birthday.

The kids were happy with their gifts and excited about their surprises from Santa. We kept it pretty low key and my husband and I didn't exchange gifts. I made the French Toast Casserole for breakfast with spiked syrup, always well received. Lunch was processed meats and cheeses (aka Hickory Farms) for everyone but me.

For dinner I made Honey Baked Ham, scalloped potatoes and Green Beans in a Bacon vinaigrette, followed by Swedish Apple Pie.

The next day I made split pea soup with the left over ham bone. I just used the recipe on the back of the split peas, as it is easy and good. Even though split pea is usually served with pumpernickel (which I did have) my husband asked me to make garlic bread. It was really easy and very good.

The next day my parents arrived. It gets pretty crowded and mine had to sleep on our pullout in the basement as my in-laws were in the guest room. For dinner, my husband grilled chicken breasts and I made rice pilaf and asparagus.

In the past we've gone out for dinner on our one night with all the parents in, but this year we weren't in a position to do it. Instead, I finally made something I've been wanting to make for a while, but was too nervous - beef tenderloin. Buying a $40 cut of meat was a bit of pressure, but my Mom convinced me it wasn't that hard, and she helped and together we made the beef and a mushroom red wine sauce, asparagus and another round of potatoes au gratin. It turned out really well. Admittedly the kids didn't really like it, but the rest of us thought it was tender and tasted great. Restaurant quality as my husband likes to say.

After dinner, my daughter put on her Brownie vest, and sold cookies to her grandparents. My parents ordered some to be sent to the troops as they don't actually like the cookies (I don't blame them), my in-laws bought a couple of boxes and we ordered a couple of boxes for us and a few others to send to the troops.

This morning my in laws I took my in-laws to the airport around 830. My parents got settled into the guest room and I started to getting the house back together, doing laundry etc.

As usual my parents have a shopping list of things they want to get. Some things online that we ordered so they can arrive before they leave. Tomorrow we head to LLBean to check on a jacket my Mom wants to get. I'm going to look for gloves for me, and exchange the shirt I got for Christmas from my in-laws. I feel bad, but the past few years they've gotten me sweaters in colors I don't have, and make a point of saying that that's why they pick them, but the reason I don't have the colors they pick is they aren't good colors for me - pinks and light greens mostly. This year they gave me gift receipts for the first time, so the return should be easier. It's mostly my fault though, since I usually have trouble coming up with a wishlist.

A Quiet House

It's Christmas Eve Eve as my kids call it. Presents are almost all bought. I just need to pick up a Hickory Farms pack tomorrow for my inlaws. I never saw them in the malls today so hopefully can find one tomorrow. I hate those processed meats and cheeses but my husband and his parents like them and it's become something of a tradition to eat it after opening presents.

My husband was working today and I spent this morning shopping with my oldest for stuff for her siblings. We lucked out at local independently owned stores (places I really need to shop at more often). We have a nice women's clothing store that has cute kids stuff in the basement. Lots of Alex crafty things and girlie stuff. My daughter picked out a book for her sister and I got some "geodes" for our budding geologist to crack open and find crystals:)

We also stopped at an independent toy store. It's very small but the shelves are stocked with great things - no licensed merchandise here. My daughter picked out a make your own fairy tale book for her sister, and I got a forklift for my son and a reversible spiderman/batman cape. It's not officially a Marvel (or whoever) item and is really cute. I was thinking i would make him one, and this was a bit pricey - $30, but by the time I buy the fabric, and get around to making it, well, he probably wouldn't want it any more. The past couple of days he's been asking me to tie a bandana around his neck as a cape. Poor kid needs more dressup clothes. Done.

We went to the supermarket and bought all the things I need for Christmas dinner and the next day (I hope). While we were at the store I found $2 on the floor. I asked the only guy in the same aisle if it was his, nope. So we bought a lottery ticket. The drawings not for another 22 minutes, might as well stay up.

After lunch and putting my son down for a nap, I went to the mall to get the last of my shopping done. I lucked out with parking, hustled through the stores I needed and as much as my FB friends were complaining of rude shoppers and sales people, everyone I encountered was nice and helpful (when they could be - of course this late pickings are slim).

I stopped at Honey Baked Ham on the way home and was home by 530. After dinner, we watched Rudolph with the kids - my first Christmas special this year. The kids were sitting in their chairs facing the TV, my husband and I on the couch off to the side. Our daughters have seen it a few times at this point, but I think this was the first time our son watched it all the way through. It was fun watching his reactions. He definitely got a little nervous with the Abominable Snow Monster. It was very cute.

After sending the kids to bed, and my husband and in-laws going to bed, I started wrapping. I was worried that this Christmas would be sparse given our financial situation but I managed to get a lot of what the kids wanted without spending a lot.

I ended up with a few extra gifts for my son, so put those away for his birthday (or to be returned) so it's not too lopsided. He's just too easy to shop for. Anything with wheels or sports oriented, he's happy. My older daughter is in that tween age where I don't want to get her teenage stuff (even though she may want it) but she's outgrown a lot of the toys and stuff. Still I found some good things for her. My younger daughter has tons of clothes and loves crafty things but her list was based on one catalog, and by the time I had money to buy gifts it was to late to have stuff shipped. I think the things I did get will be good substitutes. I hope.

My husband and I agreed not to exchange gifts this year, which is fine but then he asked me if I thought the kids would think it's weird that we're not. I don't think so, but at the same time I did get him a movie on behalf of our son, and slippers from my parents. Our daughters made stuff at school for both of us. It's possible that there will be only a couple of things under the tree for me, which is fine. I did get myself a new pair of slippers too (and wrapped them). Really what I want is a day off once all our house guests leave. My parents gave me money for my birthday so I may go and shop with it, or just go chill somewhere.

I didn't specifically get anything for my in-laws from the kids, as they each only asked for one thing and I don't know what else to get for them. Unfortunately my husband is of little help this time of year as he gets pretty busy workwise and doesn't have time to shop.

I think it's finally time for me to go to bed, as I have a busy day of baking ahead. We have no cookies left for Santa. I did put the last of the advent gifts out - Christmas pjs. This way I can be sure that they have cute pjs for Christmas morning :)

BTW, I just checked the lottery numbers, I didn't win :(

Trying to get into the Christmas spirit despite feeling sick

My in-laws arrived Friday night and as has become tradition I made spaghetti Bolognese for dinner when they arrived. After dinner my stomach was starting to feel bad. At first I thought maybe it was the wine, but I had only had 2 glasses. Since my son had been sick earlier this week I was afraid I was getting sick too. Sure enough, shortly after I got the kids to bed, I got sick :( I went to bed around 10, and not long after I heard my daughter crying. I went out to find her coming out of her room, she had thrown up too :( I got her out of her dirty pjs and started stripping her bed while occasionally darting in to my bathroom to get sick since she was using hers.

I got her cleaned up and back to bed, and about an hour later heard her getting sick again :(. I went in to help her and then my oldest came out of her room. At first I thought she was just coming out cause the bathroom light was shining in to her room, so I said, "Welcome to our puking party, do you want to join us?" Not funny since sure enough she was sick too. I sent her to our bathroom while I sat and waited for either one to finish hoping I wouldn't get sick in the meantime.

The rest of the night is a blur of who was sick when, it got to the point that I didn't respond to every sound like I normally do as I just wanted to get some sleep. I figured if they really needed me, they'd come get me, which they didn't.

By the morning my oldest and I were pretty much back to normal, but my middle one was still pretty tired. We had planned to head down to Christkindlmarkt to see the tree and have some German food. We decided to take the L rather than driving and parking two cars. The two youngest kids were free so it was much cheaper this way, and my little guy was very excited to ride the train. We got off a block away and managed to get a table in the tent pretty quickly. After some beer and gløgg, we got brats and potato pancakes. It's kind of tough to go with kids because of the crowds, although stroller parking helped. The only bathrooms were port a pottys so no changing tables.

They used to have a nice train set but not this year. They used to have a tree that was made up of lots of smaller trees and branches and while it looked nice and full, it always seemed lame that they didn't get a real tree like at Rockefeller Center. This year they got a real tree but it was very sparse and people were calling it the Charlie Brown tree. It wasn't quite that bad, but there is no doubt in my mind, they could have found a better tree.

We didn't try to walk around and look at the different stalls. It was too crowded and after being sick the kids were too tired. We headed home, everyone took a nap, and we ordered a pizza for dinner.

Then finally we decorated the tree. My oldest and youngest had a lot of fun helping and it looks good. Unfortunately my middle kid was still tired after being sick so after putting a couple of ornaments on, she laid down on the couch and just watched. When we were all done, my oldest played all the Christmas songs she has music for on the piano and then everyone went to bed. A nice ending to a rough day.

Proud of my big girl

My daughters' school has a holiday sing every winter before school lets out for break.  There is a prelude at the beginning for kids who take music lessons to perform a song on the instrument they are studying.  Each grade performs a song and at the end, all the kids in the school (over 600) perform a song together.  I'm not an overly emotional person but the last part always gives me goose bumps, it's so sweet. Last year the song was something about seeing Christmas through the eyes of a child (sung by a bunch of K-2 graders, even the Grinch would tear up). 

My oldest came home from school the other day and said that for music class each kid in her class was given the opportunity to audition for the solo for their class song. They were given a microphone and were amped (to make it like the actual performance I guess). She said that some kids were laughing at their classmates during the auditions.  I asked if anyone laughed at her and she said no but she felt bad for the kids who were laughed at.  After music they went back to their classroom and their teacher asked how it went.  My daughter without naming names said that she felt bad because some of the kids were laughed at, and she didn't think that was nice because it's hard to get up in front of a room full of people and perform and if you get laughed at you get embarrassed and may never want to do it again.  The teacher took the opportunity to talk about why it's important to respect other peoples feelings and keep negative opinions to yourself.  She even took it a step further and touched on bullying, although according to my daughter no one was teased after the fact, but still a good time to bring that up. 

I was proud of my daughter for standing up for her classmates and was a little surprised to find out that her audition had earned her a call back (although I would never say this to her, but she's not the best singer : ).  The callbacks took place during lunch and a couple of her friends were also called back, but one was not.  The one who was not was sad to be excluded. My daughter tried to make her feel better by telling her, that sometimes it's better to be one of the crowd.  Being a soloist is a lot of pressure, everyone is looking at you and if you make a mistake, it's embarrassing.

She's been taking piano for a year and a half now and has performed in three recitals. The first one she played a duet with her teacher and did great.  The second one she played on her own and stumbled at one spot when she lost her place, but otherwise played very well. She was embarrassed after that second one, but her teacher and I consoled her by saying she played very well (or as her teacher said "she played musically" - meaning that her mistake didn't take a lot away from the song, as she picked right back up and finished the piece). Third time was a charm :)

She had music class again today and was not picked to be a soloist but has been asked to play the bells for one of the songs (one of her friends will play the maracas).  I have a feeling the recognition was due to the way she handled the whole audition process, so I have to say I'm pretty proud of her.  And yes, she will be performing on the piano in the prelude as well, and is working hard at memorizing her piece. She's pretty much got it down and still has 5 days to go.