Christmas

Sunday we had a nice Christmas program at church. All the songs were really good. The Primary kids sang "Star Bright" which is a new song that I really enjoyed. Penny also sang "Away in the Manager" with some other primary girls. I like it when sacrament is more songs than talking. After church I took pictures of all the kids in their Christmas church attire. For some reason Lucy looks like a ghost. The light behind her really washed her out. 

Ruby looked super cute that day in Elf pajamas so I had to document her. She can make the silliest faces.

I spent most of Monday morning making our sugar cookie dough for our Santa cookies and pies for our Christmas Eve dinner. I luckily had no last minute errands to run for Christmas so I was able to be a hermit and not venture out into the cold and crowds. Ben was sick and spent most of the day sleeping. The girls had Geli and Luna over in the afternoon and that was good for helping their day go faster.

Tuesday we had Mariah's family and her friends that were visiting over for Christmas Eve dinner. Tyler was in charge of the meat-ham and turkey- and the Christmas punch. I had pies, and 5 cup fruit salad. They had the rest of the sides so I really had nothing major to do that day since I had done everything the day before. I baked the Santa cookies and was just going to tidy up before they came but then with the extra time I decided I wanted to decorate the tables. I did drawings on the 2 kids tables and then grabbed random stuff for the center of the grown up table. I think they turned out cute. I did the decorating while Ruby napped and the kids watched "Red One". I didn't get a picture of the second kids' table but here are 2 out of the 3.

Christmas Eve dinner turned out good. Everything was tasty and the company was nice. Mariah's friends were nice enough, almost a little too grateful for letting us host, lol, and all the little ones didn't destroy our house too much. However no one ate my banana pie except me and that made me feel sad. I guess it's because they brought a cheesecake too which they all ate. The kids did all eat my oreo pie that I made from scratch. 

After they all left we decorated Santa cookies. I only had red and green frosting so the kids made some interesting decorating choices. Everything looked a little crazy. Tyler was nice and doing the dishes so he did not participate in the cookie decorating this year. Ruby looks like she murdered her cookies.

After the cookies we opened our jammies (everyone had a quote from the movie "Elf" on their jammies), got our traditional pics and then went and saw Christmas lights in the neighborhood. We didn't travel far because we didn't have Ruby in her car seat and the Traverse had a broken headlight. We were not the safest.

Christmas day Ruby wasn't up until almost 7:30 and she woke up with a very runny nose. It was the start of a long sickness for her. She is not a happy camper when she is sick. She was able to muster up some excitement for her gifts (signing "please" when she wanted something out of its wrapping) but she began to tank after the gifts and spent most of the day cuddling me on the couch.  

For Christmas Ruby got: a baby balance bike, play dough and play dough "tools", a pretend hair salon kit (the hair dryer noise scared her at first), a Target fisher price play kit, a Melissa and Doug cleaning kit and princess shoes and a crown (from Steven).

For Christmas Steven got: a Lego Minecraft Crafting Table, a case for his oculus, a Steam giftcard and a wooden gun to build. He also got a Groot keychain from Ruby. I think he felt gipped because he had less presents than everyone...but his presents were pricey.

For Christmas Ben got: a Minecraft book, Lord of the Rings Brickheadz, a wooden gun to build, and a smart watch. He got a drawing journal from Penny and a jar full of "Chill Pills" from his friend Andrea (which he literally ate in one day).

For Christmas Penny got: a Stitch Lego set, a Corgi, Harry Potter mini brands, a Stitch watch,some books and orange peelers (because she was complaining about peeling oranges). She also got a Stitch blanket from Lucy.

For Christmas Lucy got: Disney Mini Brands, a candy shop to build, make up, Inside Out 2 Brickheadz, a wallet and a Claire's gift card. She also got a Beanie Boo from Ben (a lion with a horn that they call Ramsey who is  a Lone Wolf)

From the grandparents, all the kids got gift cards to Dave and Busters, a 2 month pass to Chuck E Cheese, an Escape the Crate Game and some money for a future outing with the kids.

A cute picture of Tyler styling Ruby's mullet.

For Christmas I got: my nose and ears pierced (and a bunch of earrings too), a new bag for church, a sweater, Lego flowers, and shoes. Keshia was my secret santa and bought me wooden flowers to build and Tara was just nice and bought me a pair of earrings and a jewlery dish to put them in. 

For Christmas Tyler got: 2 wooden guns to build, 2 Harry Potter Lego sets, a Minecraft Building book, and a D and D cookbook. Tara was his secret santa and got him a "dumb" shirt and a metal star wars ship to build. He got a lot of gifts to build.

Below is how I spent most of my Christmas- cuddling Ruby and reading a Christmas book. I did not get to build my things during the day but that night I did finish my Christmas Advent puzzle and I built one of my wooden flowers. The kids spent most of their day building all their things and watching movies. It was a very relaxed day.

Here are some of the things the girls made that day and the next...The boys are hard to get pictures of...

Thursday I spent most of the day taking down the Christmas decorations and gettting things back to normal. It honestly feels so good to get out all the clutter. The kids were not as happy about it though. They wanted the decorations up longer. That afternoon Lucy and I went and checked out the after Christmas sales. We got some good things for next year- socks, colorful ornaments, crafts, Christmas pants...

Friday morning we took the boys to a local bank to set up savings accounts- it's taken us far too long to do this. Ruby was still very sick and sad so we didn't want to leave her with the girls so we brought her along. It was a rough time with her there, she was so miserable. One of her eyes was swollen and boogery so I am sure the bank lady was not happy with us sharing her germs. I don't think it was pink eye though because the next day it was all better.

Friday afternoon Steven had his first date. He had talked to us about asking out Renee from our Ward on Christmas day and so we had helped him figure out the details. (I later read in his texts that he was nervous about talking to us about it but I think it was really awesome that he did) He ended up taking her to Marvin's Mechanical Museum and then they went out to ice cream in Milford. It seems like they both had a good time. I'm not sure exactly what inspired him to ask someone out but I do know that his friend Max had apparently checked with Renee to see her interest level before. After the date, him, Ben and Lucy went to the Stake Roller Skating Activity...where he hung out some more with Renee....

Saturday I started to feel under the weather and so did Tyler. It seems we are all getting the disease. That morning I took Penny to the eye doctor because she has been having trouble seeing things far away and sure enough, she needs glasses. She picked out some pink ones (of course) and will join the glasses club in a couple weeks. That afternoon I hit a few more shops for after Christmas sales and found a few more thing. Then that evening we watched Mariah's kids and her friends' kids (7 total) so they could go out. It seems we had shared the bug with them already and they were all boogery too but they were much less fussy than Ruby. I spent the first half just holding my fussy Ruby and then I was able to be more helpful after I put Ruby down for bed. Overall the kids were pretty easy to watch- the one baby would go to the door and ask for her mom but she was still in pretty good spirits. Also one of the friends' kids broke the "slide" on Ruby's Pikler Triangle thing that I got her for her first birthday. I know he didn't do it on purpose but that was an expensive thing for him to break.

That night, after they left, I was exhausted and went to bed but it was a horrible night. First I was woken up by someone shouting for their dog outside- I thought it was Ruby shouting at first. Then I was woken up by chills alternating with sweats. Next Ruby decided to wake up and would not go back to sleep. Tyler was nice and took her after an hour but then the power went out and someone's home generator kicking in woke me up. It was a lousy night. Thankfully the power came back on at 7:30 so we didn't have to get ready for church in the dark.