Two Christmases

Yes, a Christmas post in February. So sorry 🙈

But I wanted needed to document the festivities! We had really good Christmases and lovely family time with relatives! Our kids are still under the impression that Santa exists because we just don't have the heart to tell them otherwise. So Christmas eve, we did the things that parents usually do to trick our kids, to put it bluntly. The kids loved waking up to their gifts Santa brought them under Nana's beautiful Santa-themed tree, and we had a good time opening the rest of the gifts.

Gary's mom and sister thought they would be funny and gifted me this rad ensemble. Jonah thought he'd be funny and gifted his Dad a 6-can holster for his Dr. Peppers. 

And Elena's Nana sewed up this mermaid for her. Super cute! 

The kids played with their toys and later on we headed to over to Moomie's to celebrate Christmas once again. 

We usually make tamales on Christmas Eve there, and family gathers round to make some really tasty ones with Moomie's heavenly salsa (seriously, the best!) Elena requested to make cookies for Santa, too! 

Aunt Debbie was a great sport, I believe this was her first time joining us for Tamale Night. Elena also volunteered to help. They both goofed off and made a snowman out of "masa". They looked like they were enjoying themselves.

And finally, it was time to have supper and enjoy the fruits of our labor! 

Christmas evening, after everyone gathered again, the kids were hustled to the Christmas tree in the big room. They liked what they saw....

After dumping our stockings, we started on the gifts! 

Chaos and trash and hugs and 'thank you's' were shouted across the room. The kids elated, the adults grateful and finally able to sigh that sweet sigh of relief. 

Good old Wita, my grandmother, was rocking the show with the hard candies and the green bills to everyone! 

Gary's mother-in-law is so thoughtful, she knew this is just what he wanted for Christmas, right babe? 

This year I thought super long and hard to do something super special for my mama. I wanted to give her a new gallery wall in her dining room. The same painting had been hanging there since 2006 and it was time for change. 

I looked forever and ever for the perfect wall decor items to carefully arrange on that wall. She cried a itty bitty tear and that's when I knew, she liked it.

Dawna helped me install it, and it came out fantastic! 

The days after Christmas are a blur. Like, what day is it? Should I have that 5th or 8th cookie? Is it lunch time or dinner? What-shall-we-do-today type of blur. 

The kids' toys roamed the house for a few days, played a lot of games, lots of coffee was consumed, watched a lot of shows, ate way too much candy, and enjoyed each other's company. 

'Til next year! 

We Did ALL THE THINGS in December

You know those blurry few weeks before Christmas that just seem to speed by? As if we don't know when Dec. 25 comes along and yet we're shocked at how fast Christmas came, right? 

One of the things that I absolutely love about my community (even though the list of dislike is pretty darn sizable), is the fact that there's always something to do. There's never a week between November and December where nothing is going on. 

Those blurry weeks included all kinds of activities, new experiences -- accustomed ones too -- and most likely always in GO mode. 

We rang in the new month with an Open House to our local police station. The brand new station was SO needed in our community, one of the Detectives was incredibly nice and showed us around the place. Even into the small cells they have and an interrogation room! The boys saw the drones they use and tried on their equipment. They were fascinated. I was fascinated by how amazing their sausage on a stick was. Whoever grilled those, they were delicious.

The yearly Christmas show at our church is always fun. We didn't know it before, but I finally found out that if you show up to the last show, you'll get a better seat than when you show up to the earlier showings. This year, they had a cranky old neighbor who refused to decorate his house. It was kinda funny, and the songs are ALL good. Worthwhile message too ;)

We attended another open house in our community. This time at the Improvement District for the county. They have free supper for us, so we go. Andrew ate all the shrimp #sorrynotsorry

And we take a stroll out to their light display. That night was very chilly and windy. Jonah and Gary forgot to take jackets!

There was a tour of Bethlehem at a nearby town and I convinced everyone to join me. It was actually a very nice, low-key, production! They had a real live camel, a real live Baby Jesus (although not the original) and a whole town-full of commerce from 0 A.D. and a whole spread of food from back in that time. 

I ate 2 servings of olives because yum. They had dried fruit, unleavened bread, honey, almond cookies, and many other things I don't remember. I am starting to sense a pattern where I'll go basically wherever they give me free food. 

The kids made bracelets, watched candles being made AND made their own with beeswax, they cracked nuts (Andrew's favorite) and got a little sack full of rocks to play tic-tac-toe with (2 colors of stones). Jonah loved feeding the camel and I enjoyed the food of course. Gary was just there for support. This kind of thing, well he just tolerates it. 

Somehow we managed to put up all the Christmas decorations, and make custom cut snowflakes that we dipped into food coloring. I don't know why...snowflakes are white. 

But Elena sure had a blast changing her mind which one was her favorite after she made me cut them all. She's actually a pretty good snowflake pattern maker!

We also found time one late Sunday, to attend a church service at a new church called Hosanna Woodlands in Conroe, because I heard that Marcos Witt would be there. His son-in-law and his own daughter are the church leaders. 

I didn't think he would be so nice, but he was. He was an angel and let us take a picture with him! 

Our own church finally had a thing! Yes, a family thing! They do not put out family events after service very often, but I guess they decided December needed one because why not just cram ALL OF THE EVENTS into December?! 

The kids had a .5 second blast going down the ice slide in 80 degree weather. Not worth the line, by the way, in my opinion, but I guess the kids liked it. I wanna know when all these community events will start having grown-up rides for all of us cranky and old and out-of-patience parents? 

Andrew and Jonah went down like 500 times. How? 

There was a Christmas party at our local skating rink and lucky Jonah won the raffle drawing with the most massive MnM's ever! (just so you know, it's 18 individual packaged MnM's.....) Gary couldn't hang with his wife, the-skater-with-the-biggest-butt-but-can-still-out-skate-you, so he rested a lot. That was a fun night. The kids beg to go back. 

Oh, look. Food again. We obviously celebrated the brand new restaurant that we have been waiting for our whole lives to open near us -- Buffalo Wild Wings. Pretty rad. 

We OBVIOUSLY found time to craft Christmas houses out of foam craft. Because, why not? We just added it to our collection. It was very trying times, patience trying times to say the least. Everyone's happy when it's over.

The kids got to write letters to Santa, send them to the North Pole, and get responses back from the jolly fella himself! 

Oh, and because when we do December and all the things, we also did Gingerbread houses. I know, we're all mad here. 

This year, Andrew learned how to wrap presents. He wrapped all of our portraits that hang on the walls. He did a wonderful job. Even begged to buy ribbon and bows to finish the look. Our little tree looked so good this year. It always looks good :) 

And you guys! We almost completed it this year! Our Advent Lego Calendar for the 2nd year in a row has never reached Day 24 (sighhhh). 

Maybe next year! 

Have you ever done so many things as we did in December? Looking back at it, we're kinda nuts huh?! December just doesn't have enough days in it....