Christmas!

 Christmas week the countdown continued. On Sunday the kids unwrapped a new puzzle that absolutely no one was excited about. I guess from now on I should stop buying a puzzle for the kids and just buy one for myself. A couple of the kids were nice and sat down and did puzzles with me. You can tell Lucy wasn't thrilled and Penny did not help but was insistent on being in the picture with the true helper, Ben.

On Monday the kids got a new game called Beat That- it was like Minute to Win It. I always think new games will be fun with the kids but my kids are terrible at being graceful losers...and they were really good at losing this game. The challenges were as you can expect, challenging and I thought it was fun just to try the challenges but my kids felt very differently. 

Monday afternoon the girls and I took a trip down to Ikea to get a coffee table to put the guinea pig's cage on. For so long the cage has been on a tiny kid's table that they were lucky it hadn't fallen off of. The girls had a blast at Ikea- sitting on couches and admiring furniture- seriously! But as we finished up the first floor they started complaining about being tired so I ended up pushing them around in the cart on the bottom level. Lazy bums.

That day Lucy also melted a candy cane in to a heart shape as some fun Christmas science. I put way to much cooking spray on the heart cookie cutter and the candy cane was a buttery/greasy mess but she still loved it. 

Monday evening the Primary had a drive by where the kids all got to wave at "Santa" and got presents and then afterwards we want to a house that had lights timed to music which was pretty fun.

Tuesday we attempted to make gum drop Christmas trees which really turned into towers. This was not part of the countdown but just me trying to entertain children while on break.

Penny's was not so successful, she got really frustrated.

For our countdown we had hot cocoa after dinner. I had some caramel hot cocoa which was really really good. Tyler made the mistake of using new mugs that I had just bought and drawn the kids names on but had not cooked in the oven yet. Amazingly hot cocoa washes Sharpie right off. Boo.

Wednesday the May family was done with their 2 week quarantine so we went to their house to play. It was so good to be with friends and catch up on the last 2 weeks. I also talked with her about my desire to start a drop in babysitting service twice a week where I read a book, do a craft/activity and give the kids a snack. She said she wants to join in and do a music time. It would be really awesome if once Covid ends I could set this up and get a hand full of kids coming. I think I would enjoy this way more than subbing.

Wednesday evening we made cookies for Santa as part of our countdown. Traditionally we do that Christmas Eve but it always has felt stressful because I am cooking a fancy meal too so we decided to do it Christmas Eve Eve. 

On Thursday, Christmas Eve, I spent the day tidying up the house and cooking. We had our neighbors Mike and Sharon over for dinner that evening. I was really anxious about having them over. I was worried that it would be awkward since they really just hang with our kids but it turned out good. She did talk pretty negatively about our neighborhood lake association and some other things but we were never short of conversation which was good. They also brought each of our kids a book and that was much appreciated. Mike sat down with the girls and read them the book they got. They really are good to our children.

As the kids started getting wild Sharon and Mike made the wise choice to leave so we cleaned up while the kids watched Rudolph and then we opened up our Christmas Jammies- it was a Garfield theme this year because we are so weird.

After putting on our Jammies we did our traditional drive through the neighborhoods to see Christmas lights. Then it was homeward bound and off to bed. Now this year is the first year that both my boys are in the know about Santa so I had told them that once the girls fell asleep they could be Santa Helper's and help make Penny's dollhouse. Well, they both fell asleep at the same time the girls did so I had to shake them awake to come help but I am glad I did. Steven and dad put together the house and Ben helped me fill stockings, eat cookies and write a letter to Lucy.

Christmas day was really really good. The kids were all up and noisy at 6am and at 7 we went downstairs to watch them quickly open their presents. Then the kids played with all their things while I read a book, worked on a puzzle, napped....lived the good life. Here they are being blinded by my flash as they prepare to go downstairs.

Ben got a castle, Minecraft Minifigures and airheads from Santa. He got a Minecraft Dungeon Lego set, Color by Number and Garfield books from us. 

Penny got a dollhouse, Minecraft Minifigures and M&M's from Santa. From us she got Pokemon Cards, Sonic books, coloring books, fancy scissors and a tie dye kit.

Lucy got a swing for her room, Minecraft Minifigures and Mike & Ike candy from Santa. From us she got a Karaoke Microphone, an Echo Dot (or an Alexa as she calls it), coloring book, Garfield book and tie dye kit.

Steven got a retro game player, Minecraft Minifigures and a chocolate bar from Santa. From us he got a Lego Architect Set, a graphing calculator and gaming headphones.

I got a bike rack for my car, a book, 2 shirts, a giant bucket of Jelly Bellies and a Mouse Nutcracker.

Tyler got the Harry Potter castle Lego set, 2 stupid shirts, a Lego Movie Lego set and a gun holster.

In the afternoon we had a fun video chat with my family (while eating our Bethlehem dinner). The kids really enjoyed showing off all the things and it was fun just to see my family and chat with them. After our chat we headed to the Bloomfield's house for a little Christmas get together with them and the May's. There were yummy snacks and treats. The kids watched a movie and played, and the adults had a white elephant gift exchange, played a saran wrap gift game and did an impossibly hard mask puzzle. There were so many good laughs. White elephants gifts involved- a puzzle made from a funny pic of a friend, an autographed pic of a friend's hubby, a box of half used lotion bottles, a desktop dancing tube thing, a Pres Trump predicto ball (a magic 8 ball of sorts), and funny apology notes. I ended up with the half used lotion bottles, lucky me. And the Saran ball had goofy things too inside-can of meat, 1 glove, cheese sauce in a packet...Tyler and Alan ended up each getting 1 rubber glove and many laughs ensued from that. It was seriously such a good way to end Christmas day.

Countdown to Christmas

 Last Sunday we had in person church which is always so nice. It was great to be able to talk to a few of my young women in person, I have had such a disconnect with them lately. I really wish we could get back to in person church more often. It's so easy for the young women to drop it all when everything is virtual. I worry about them a lot and sometimes feel like a failure because we only get about half the girls at activities and lessons. But I try to remember that ultimately it's their decision and that more is on their parents than me, and unfortunately a lot of their parents are just not super supportive.

Last Sunday also started the countdown to Christmas- where we get to open an envelope each day for a special thing/activity. Sundays activity was to make cards for people. I feel like in the past the kids don't love this one but they really seemed to enjoy it this time. I had printed our cards that they could color in and they had a lot of fun with this and a lot of fun choosing who to send the cards to. They sent to grandparents, cousins, friends, and primary teachers. The only kid not big into it was Steven and quite honestly, he was that way for pretty much every countdown activity this week. Apparently he's getting too "cool" for such things.

Monday we had a movie night. I bought the kids The Garfield Thanksgiving/Christmas movie and we picked up some candy and popcorn. Tuesday they had a Christmas craft. This year it was coloring door hangers. I think that we've already broken 2 of them so apparently not a high quality craft.

Wednesday the kids got new Christmas headbands/hats and socks. I had bought them last year and thought the kids could have fun wearing them to school or church Christmas parties but thanks to Covid neither of those things happened this year. So instead they wore them to homeschool.

Wednesday night I had a virtual activity with the older yw, they did cardmaking. Only 2 girls showed up. I know it's midterm time but that was such a sad turnout. On the bright side it was really nice to be able to chat with the older girls. Especially one of them that I have had some struggles with in the past. I felt like I got to know her a little better and form a better connections with her.

Thursday we went to the Wayne County Lightfest. We brought along our neighbor, Jacob. This is a tradition the kids always seem to look forward too. We had a little hiccup with Google Map on the way there and somehow ended up a part of a line of cars that was a Scout Troop. Coincidentally enough, Tyler knew the Scout leader and they chatted for a minute before we got to the proper place. The car line for the lights was long but not too terrible. It was mostly fun looking at all the displays but near the end the kids started to get obnoxiously loud and words were exchanged. Then on the way home Steven decided to be an know it all about something he didn't actually know and we had the most ridiculous fight with him ever. Sometimes, tweens.

Quite honestly, Steven had a rough day Thursday in general. I had gotten lazy about checking in on him with Science because I was working closely with him on math, history and language arts. I guess I had hoped this would be the one subject he could do independently. It turns out that for the last month he was picking and choosing what lessons he did. If the lesson seemed challenging or he just felt like Googling random things that day, then he skipped a lesson. I was so frustrated with his choice. The consequence was no screen time until he got caught up. He was not so happy with this.

Onto better things, on Friday we had our annual Graham Cracker House party. This is always my favorite party. It's always such a hit with everyone involved. This year we had my friend Stacey's family and then Jacob's family. Usually we have Stefanie's family but they were worried about covid so they opted not to come. I decided to do prizes this year and that was a good choice. Everyone tried a lot harder when it came to decorating their houses. In the end Jacob's brother Ethan won for most fun house. Jenna won for most beautiful. And Steven won for most unique. 

Saturday for the countdown, the kids did a white elephant gift exchange with Jacob and Ethan. This was not enjoyable for me. They did not do well with passing, stealing, switching. So much drama. They also never could remember which way was left and which way was right when passing which was super annoying. I think my hormones are also a bit out of whack today because I felt unreasonably angry during it all. Hopefully they at least had some fun. Penny ended up with a farting coloring book, Lucy with a Fart Zone sign, Steven with a puking doll, Ben with an annoying hamster that repeats what you say, Ethan with a flying monkey and Jacob with a taco cat shirt.