Christmas

Well, here is the long overdue post documenting Christmas 2013!  This year marked the first year we had Christmas in our own home!  It was a lot of fun, but we've decided it is a lot of work as well! It's a lot easier when your mom is taking care of having everything just so. :)  But it was fun to be able to celebrate here.

We had a early Christmas celebration with Michael and Sarah, and had a lot of fun singing Christmas carols together.  They gave us this Jenga game, which the boys love, and have renamed "Timber."  Alan could never remember the name, so Timber pretty much took over.

Our little Santa elf on Christmas Eve!

Here we are getting ready for our Christmas Eve dinner.  It was so fun to have Grandma and Grandpa Robertson with us that night and the next morning!

After the kids were in bed, the evening was spent assembling these blocks and other toys, wrapping last minute gifts, and finishing stockings.  We have a bit of an Angry Birds Star Wars obsession around here, and thought these little plushes and blocks would be fun for the boys.  On Christmas morning when Alan walked out he immediately yelled, "Yes!  Just what I've always wanted!" and without missing beat, picked up Chewbacca and threw him at the blocks.  It was pretty funny.

Here is our tree with entirely too many gifts.

Chillin in our bed before we went out to open gifts.  It had been a long night.  James had an ear infection. At least it was better than last year.  But still, a very long night.

The slinky was a hit.  Pretty sure we could have stopped after that with James.  We had to keep bribing him to open more gifts.  He loved each one so much he wanted to stop and play and had no interest in opening any more gifts.

And the obsession continues. He loved about everything he got.

Lucy took a nap during the middle of the present opening, and finished opening her gifts at Grandma and Grandpa Robertson's house after Christmas dinner that evening.

We had a wonderful Christmas and are so very blessed.  It was so fun to be able to still be with family, even though we were at our own place.  We are especially grateful for our Savior and this special time of love and giving!

Christmas Preparations

Time for a massive catch up blog post capturing some of our many Christmas 2013 preparations.

We went down to Waltham to decorate gingerbread houses with these old friends before they moved.  We will miss them!!

Finished products about to be devoured

Random cute Lucy pic had to be included

This was our first year staying at our house for Christmas.  Thus, we wanted a real tree, and Scott really wanted to cut one down ourselves.  However, time was hard to come by and we didn't actually get out to get one until Dec. 14th.  

We went to a tree farm here in Billerica, but the cut your own field had been closed for the season.  So we ended up getting a pre-cut one.  It was still pretty fun.

And they had free hot apple cider.

Everyone was super helpful in getting the tree all set up.

Alan took charge of the decorating and loved it.

We had a super fun ward Christmas party.  Seriously one of the best ward parties I have ever been to.  It was a "Polar Express" theme and was so cute and well planned.  The kids wore their jammies.

And got to meet Santa!

They pretty much loved it.  He asked if they had been good and checked their names off the (ward) list.

Alan had seen a video of him decorating cookies with Grandma Robertson a couple of years ago and really wanted to do that again.  He even got to help make the cookies this year.

James enjoyed the decorating process as well

And of course, the eating part was pretty fun too.

Lucy and Grandma

Alan was Joseph at our Joy School nativity play this year.

Knocking on the "door" at the "inn"

We have a pretty good group of kids here!  They did a wonderful job on the play and the songs.

And last, but not least, I did finish Lucy's stocking.  I may have had to run to the fabric store to buy the embroidery floss for the Christmas lights string at 5pm before they closed at 6 on Christmas Eve.  And I might have spent the majority of Christmas Eve finishing it, but we gotter done. :)

Snow

Winter is upon us here in Boston.  It came earlier than usual and it really hasn't melted since it first came.  We were taken by surprise one night. Alan had woken up to use the bathroom around 3am.  He could not go back to sleep.  He kept saying it was morning time, and he was very persistent.  Despite the fact that his clock did not say 6 yet.  And despite many explanations that 3 was many hours away from 6, logic did not prevail.  He kept saying it looked like morning.  After a while, I finally got up to get a drink.  And then I looked outside. Reality hit. It had snowed. Albeit about an inch, but it was enough for "the moon on the breast of the new-fallen snow [to give] the luster of mid-day to objects below."  Yeah, Clement C Moore wasn't kidding. My 4 year old was convinced it was daytime. Now who in their right mind tells a 4 year old in the middle of the night that it has snowed for the first time this season. Well, me. Because it would convince him that it was the middle of the night.  And he somehow went right back to sleep.

But the next morning, excitement could no longer be contained. As I was sleeping (after said nighttime experience) Scott let these little guys out to play first thing.  And he snapped these photos which I think, really capture the excitement of the first snow.

And here are a few more pictures after we got a bit more.

James is so silly and refuses to wear his big coat.  He will only wear this little jacket.  He doesn't last long.  Alan, on the other hand, gets all geared up and goes out almost every day no matter how cold it is.  After watching Rudolph, he's taken to being Yukon Cornelius and prospecting.  I caught him throwing the garden spade up in the air and then tasting it. (yeah we put an end to that.) But the snow gives Scott a good work out  keeping up with shoveling.  And Lucy and I mostly stay inside.  Welcome Winter and recent polar vortex coldness. Hopefully it warms up soon?