Our Christmas adventures

After our trip to Florida at Thanksgiving, we went straight to work in prepping for Christmas -- buying a tree and decorating it adding a few decorations around the house.  This year, we did not have time to bake or do some of the advent activities that we typically participate in... but... we made the most of the few weeks we had at home between the trip to Florida and the trip that we embarked on to visit family in NC and NJ.

We decorated gingerbread stuff:  I helped out in the toddler room with the graham-cracker-covered milk carton "gingerbread house" decorating.    It's always a riot to see how the little tiny kids engage in this.  They have a really hard time understanding that the candies and graham crackers are for decorating... not for sampling.   Todd and the kids decorated a giant (store-bought) gingerbread man here at home as well while I went to a girl's night out.  Mercer made some sort of gingerbread man trap at school too.    CHECK - gingerbread (or similar graham cracker confection decorating) covered.




We visited Santa up on the square:  this year, Isabella was at least in the picture for the holiday card!  But - she had to be persuaded to stay on Santa's lap.  We bribed her with a toy dog that was there on the floor of Santa's workshop.  She could hold it if she would sit on the ol guy's lap.  She would not look at him or make eye contact.  She would not speak to him.

  Weird.  From afar when she saw him, she yelled and waved for him "hi Santa."  "hi!"  We got into the workshop and she totally changed her tune.  Oh well!       CHECK - Santa.  

Here are some photos of the kids while waiting to see Santa.  Oh... the goofy faces.  We'll never get another serious photo - ever.  

(Mercer told Santa that he wanted a remote control meerkat.  and he wrote this little narrative about this at school too.  Sadly, Mercer said he did not get everything he wanted for Christmas.  He specifically called that gift out.  Hmmm... never seen an RC meerkat.  Oh well.  He'll be fine!)

We saw some lights:  near Mercer's school is a street that decks out their trees with lighted balls.  One night - while Todd was out with some guys - the kids and I did a driving tour there as well at a nearby neighborhood that had one house that was over-the-top.  The kids loved the 1000's of lights at that particular house.  Isabella said "that is awe-some!"  Just thought it was funny to hear her say that phrase.      CHECK - Viewing Lights.

We sang some carols:  this year... Isabella really got into the singing!  She sort of knows Silent Night and Frosty the Snowman.  There was a lot of impromptu singing.... even on Mercer's part.  So sweet.  One of my favorite things about the season is singing Christmas carols at church.  We got to do a little bit of that as well when we went to advent services.    CHECK - Singing.  

The elves came to visit us and check in on the kids.  They were a little bold this year, however, dragging out Christmas lights in a tangle and even rolling our living room / dining room with toilet paper.  (I think we need elves to watch over our elves!)  CHECK.

I got to go to the Marietta Christmas Home Tour with some girls and went to a Christmas play with them at a "mega" church nearby as well.     At our own church, there was a live nativity which was pretty cool.  There were some unusual animals there -- all kid friendly, thankfully.    CHECK - (sort of) there was not really enough of the church-related stuff as there should have been.

Then, of course, there was a little bit of shopping / packing / Christmas card writing / finishing grading papers / etc. to do before we could hit the road.    We also had our little family Christmas celebration together at home.   CHECK.




After Mercer's basketball game and getting the rental van, we packed up and began our journey north.  We started at my mom's.  This year, she had a family Christmas party at her house.  Almost everyone came out for a little while to hang out, eat, catch up, and watch the kids open packages. 

Mom's house is close to her parents house.... so either before or after the Christmas party - most everyone stopped by to visit with Great-Grandma.  

Our visit was after the family party.  The kids are pretty active and Great-Grandma and Great-Grandpa are content watching them run, jump, play.  Isabella was showing off cartwheels (sort of -- her version of them).  She also wanted everyone to make silly faces when we had our daily visit and she took her own photos there.  You can tell that she demanded silly faces and got her finger in a picture or two~



While in NC, we also popped over to see my Aunt Becky and Uncle Tony -- and their dogs.    The weather was rainy while in NC, so there was not a lot of outdoor time on either of the farms.   





















We continued up the road to Todd's mom's in NJ.   She is putting the house on the market in a couple of months.  It was the second "last" Christmas there (2014 was supposed to be, but the house did not go on the market in 2015, so there was one more "last.")  She's been working on getting things fixed up in the house, removing all traces of shag carpet and addressing some code-related issues.  Knowing that this is the last time that she's hosting Christmas, we planned to go up before the rest of the family got there and pop into New York City for a day trip.  

But.... the rain squelched those plans as well.  We found an indoor play place for the kids - photos above... then, Todd, Mercer, and I went to the Star Wars movie while Isabella was napping that afternoon.  

Poor Mercer was scared throughout much of the movie and watched it behind fingers in front of his eyes and/or buried in my arm.  

Todd's siblings started to arrive on Christmas Eve.... and the volume in the house ramped up and up and up!  Here's a shot on Christmas Eve of Rose Marie with Tara, Marley, Isabella, and Meghan -- her 4 granddaughters.  

There were 14 - 18 people in the house over the course of a Christmas Eve / Christmas day.  [+ a stow-away cat that supposedly rode up from south Jersey in the trunk of Tonia's car~]  We found a sliver of clear skies and took our "last" walk around Mountain Lakes ooh-ing and ahh-ing at the beautiful 1920's Craftsman-inspired "Hapgood Homes."    

I seriously love these houses -- so much so that I researched them once for a vernacular architecture class in college!   I *NEED* to go up sometime there's a home tour to go inside and see how fabulous they are.  
http://mtnlakes.org/about-mountain-lakes/our-history/    http://mtnlakes.org/HousePix/OtherPhotos.php

We went to the cool little train shop one last time as well.  We will miss that great little historic NYC "resort" town. 

The next morning was rife with activity as Santa visited and brought toys for the kids.   Mercer's toys mainly consisted of remote control things.  (here's a shot of the older cousins checking out Mercer's "terrain twister" in the lake beyond and on the hill.)  There was some Star Wars stuff, of course, too.  

 

Isabella's toys mostly consisted of things related to dogs and the movie "Frozen."  She got three different dogs -- one that breathes, one that flips backwards, and one that vibrates perfect for snuggling.  She got this outfit and stripped down on the spot, put it on, and demanded that people watch her twirl~  Later that evening, most of the gang went out for bowling... a good thing to do with a houseful of people on a rainy Christmas evening~  These shots of Marley and Isabella are precious!  She has always loved on Isabella so much!

Had to post this shot of Sam - Bobby's son.  There's a glimpse 50 years into the future on that one!!  ha~

The next day.... we loaded up the car and the kids and headed back to NC.  Between driving and stops, we were on the road 12 hours.  The kids were STIR CRAZY to say the least.  

Thankfully, there was a little bit of sun (between some misty showers), mom took us to the NC zoo.  We started at the playground to let the kids burn off some energy.  It was wet - but oh well.  

(Here's a shot on a cute little lady bug that I have a photo of Mercer on when he was one - check out the May 20, 2009 blog post to compare, if interested.)     

Also - here's a funny pic of Isabella making faces at the chimpanzee exhibit.  

It really is a fantastic zoo.

   

There was ONE more thing that we did that was Christmas-related....although after we got back from our trip / after Christmas:  we FINALLY went to Six Flags "Holiday in the Park."  There was finally a day where it wasn't raining, but it was cold.  We bundled up and went to explore / went to check it out.  It was pretty well done!  We've been wanting to go for awhile - so CHECK on that one too! 

Sometimes the holidays feel like a checklist.  There are so many things to do with the kids & we want to get it all in.  Unfortunately, there's no way to do that -- I suppose the most important part is getting in what we can, creating fun memories for the kids, and honoring the true meaning of Christmas.  (There's a cool book that we got that we added to our library this year called "Why do they Call it Christmas" that was written by the guy who does the Veggie Tales movies.  It's pretty good and has a some nice explanations on why Santa is a part of this holiday focused on Jesus.) 

It's hard to not check things off a list and hard not to compare our holidays to those "picture perfect" ones you see in the media, on cards, and in books.  One of the things I love about going to the home tour is finding a home that is truly warm.  One that is NOT perfect.  One that has chipped paint, kids artwork hanging up, one with the handmade ornaments and mis-matched trees.  

Trying to find a way to sum up this blog post.... there's a house on tour that I've been to before.  They have a wall full of 20+ years of photos with Santa.  The 3 children (yes photographed even into their twenties) posed perfectly year after year after year.  The well-dressed / well-behaved perfect little toddlers... adolescents... and teens.  (It is cute that the kids still did that for their moms into their adulthood.)  But - I realized that it doesn't have character.  It's nice to see the growth, but it doesn't show any personality.  Our life -- RICH with personality!  I love that last year, you could barely see Isabella in the Christmas photo and this year, she's solemn.  One year, Mercer was wriggling his way out of Santa's arms.  We don't have those perfectly posed.  We've got mis-match.  We've got character.  It ain't perfect, but we've got a house full of love!