Merry Christmas

Merry Day After Christmas! I vowed to take the day yesterday just relaxing with my family at home. It was amazing! Opening presents, eating great holiday food, playing board games & Wii games and just generally having fun together. I love my family!!!

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I put my phone away for the day since I knew we didn't have to be anywhere and no one really needed anything on Christmas. Then I was really bummed because I ended up missing texts from my little brother, my big brother, my mom and 27 from our baby's mom. (No, that's not a typo. She reallly texted me 27 times in 2 hours yesterday)Steve got me a really cool blue tooth device for my phone for Christmas so hopefully I won't be missing so many phone calls anymore! At least that's what he's hoping!
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I was so tired last night that I forgot to set a "don't get up before" rule. As in, don't get up before 7am or even 6am. It's only 5:30 now and Steve's already chased 3 kids back to bed.

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Taylor Says

Taylor and I were at our local grocery store at 6:30am yesterday and we kept seeing smiling employees everywhere. They were always asking us if we needed help, telling us Merry Christmas and being just plain friendly. They're usually very nice there but it just seemed like every one was especially cheerful that morning. As we were checking out, I mentioned to Taylor that the employees were really happy and helpful today. Her response to me was, "Well duhhhhhh!  It's two days before Christmas!"

Christmas Holiday!

As you can tell, I haven't had a lot of time lately. Today is the first day of my Christmas holiday! I'm declaring it so!

I'm already enjoying this Christmas weekend. I'm sitting at my computer with a cup of coffee. A few of the kids are downstairs quietly watching TV and the rest of the family is still sleeping.

 

• The kids have been out of school since noon on Wednesday, so no more running to school concerts, plays, parties or taking the forgotten, I-have-to-have-it-right-now-or-the-world-will-end items to school.
• Zeke's physical therapy at the hospital is only on Mondays and Wednesdays and we don't have to be back there until the 27th.
• The baby doesn't have any physical therapy, early childhood education, early headstart, PALS, doctor appointments, helmet checks or visits until next week, so I won't have to cart her out into the deep snow until after Christmas.
• Riley's basketball and piano lessons will continue after Christmas.
• Brittney's High School Gymnastics team practiced yesterday for the last time until after Christmas. I think she goes back on Monday though.
• Steve has today off so he'll be home Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Then he works next week to complete the last of his 5 days with Daktronics before starting his new job in January..

Today, we're just relaxing. The kids will get to dig into their stockings from Grandma Letoy this morning. For lunch, I'll let them help make either manicotti or stromboli. Tonight at 5, we'll head down the street to church for the candlelight service. It's one of our family's favorite holiday traditions. The kids know if they behave during the service, they get to have their candle lit. You've never seen such well-behaved children in a church service before! When we get home, we snack and the kids usually talk me into letting them open one present.
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Christmas morning, it gets a bit chaotic for a while. But it's so fun! First, we read the Christmas story. And I mean the one from the bible about Jesus,  not Old St Nick. Steve's dad had a tradition of reading from a book his father had written that combined all the new testiment into chronological order. It's interesting for adults who find that fasinating, but it was really long and indepth for the little ones. We opted to keep a variation of the tradition by reading a more child friendly verson.
Then the kids get to open their presents. Every year, Steve and I try to get each child the one thing (within reason) that they seemed to really want throughout the year. Not buying our kids much extra during the year really pays off during Christmas because they're so excited to get something they wanted. During the past few weeks, I also took each kid shopping individually. I give them $25 and they pick out gifts for their siblings for five dollars or less. It's really fun to watch them learn to budget money and find things that they know someone else will like. The first year I decided to do that, I was afraid that they'd just get a bunch of junk, but they really know what their brothers and sisters would like! Every year it seems to be a bit more complicated to take each child though. I made it all the way to Anthony before the hectic schedule overtook me. So thanks Grandma Connie for taking him shopping and helping finish the Christmas tradition this year!
After presents and while the kids are busy (both big and little), I make blueberry muffins.
This year, I'm actually going to make the entire Christmas dinner just for us. When the kids were younger, they didn't really care about Christmas dinner, so unless we were at someone else's house or had someone coming to our house, we didn't go the traditional route. This year, all but the baby are old enough to help and we'll be making ham, potatoes & gravey, greeen been casserole, etc for our "little" family of 8. It'll be great! There's no pressure for it to be perfect, just to feed us a good meal and have some family time.
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Sunday, we'll go to church in the morning, have some lunch and then head out to my folks for some sledding, hot chocolate, soup supper (or as Taylor thought she heard me say, "stupid supper?"), and lots more presents.
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7am and I think I only have 3 kids awake so far! Wow! A few are actually sleeping in.
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I am SO looking forward to a relaxing few days!

Christmas 2003

Papa Steve & Taylor

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This is the first picture we ever saw of our boys.

It was taken a few months before we met them in person.

Riley was 4, Zeke was 3 and Anthony was a little over 1.

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