Santa Claus is Coming to Town

This season I sang that song to Andrew almost every night. He thought it was funny and I was hoping it would help him stay in bed because "He sees you when you're sleeping. He knows when you're awake." It didn't really, but it was fun. Yesterday when I played the Michael Buble version of it he sang it loud and strong it was cute. Christmas Eve was a wonderful day. We had been up late the night before at the Buckley Christmas party and the boys did not sleep well so I was up and down with them and did not sleep well at all. Steve finally made breakfast burritos around 9:45. Then he helped me fix the shelves in my kitchen cupboards. It was my present new shelf pins because the original plastic ones were breaking and the size was weird so we finally found some that we could make work after we wrapped them in a little tape. ;) I was in desperate need. My spice shelf just crashed one night while we were watching a movie we heard it fall. So he would fix them and then I would reorganize those cupboards. Of course it was the crazy cupboards that were desperately in need of reorganizing so it took a couple of hours. I took a bath which was nice so nice. Then we made our traditional Christmas Eve chocolate cake to celebrate the birth of Jesus. Ellie said this is one of her favorite Christmas traditions we have and she was a big helper. She measured all the sugar and flour, I didn't double check and the cake is quite as sweet as it should be, but a little scoop of ice cream does the trick. It's so moist and yummy. As soon as Andrew saw the cake he was determined to get a piece as soon as possible and planted himself right in front of it.

After dinner we watched the Luke 2 Nativity video played with Amy Grant's Breath of Heaven, it's my favorite! We talked about the events of Jesus's birth. When the new star appeared in the video I asked Andrew what it said. He said, "the star is not talking." Ok, what did the new star symbolize or mean to the people. It was a symbol that the Savior was born. Then we talked about how choice people Mary and Joseph must have been to be blessed with the opportunity to be 'parents' to Jesus, but it came with it's trials, he was born in a manger. We all have our own trials and struggles, but we have to remain faithful for Heavenly Father has a plan it may not make sense at that moment, but it will all be made right. Andrew asked to watch it again. So we did. Then we did some more of our Gospel Art Kit readings that we've been doing since Ellie was 2. Lila said this is one of her favorite traditions we do and I have to agree. No matter how many times we read those stories we learn something new or find a new way it applies to our life in that moment. It is truly amazing! This year we also tried to watch the Light the World videos The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints released to help us all become a little more Christ-like. Anyway, we had missed a few days do to skiing and the family party so we played catch-up and it the spirit was strong after watching the Nativity and reading more about the Savior. It was a beautiful Christmas Eve! Then we ate cake.

 
Steve worked on the basement and finished installing our new video doorbell for the rest of my Christmas present.  When he rang it Andrew said, "The Jingle Bell it works." Then they made everyone that came to the door push the button and we did have a couple of visitors. We finally set a piece of cake out for Santa and sent the kids to bed around 7:45. I love that in their notes they each mentioned what the other one wanted without knowing they did that, it was sweet and Ellie made sure to tell Santa that they will be in the basement next year so he doesn't miss them or get confused. ;)

We awoke this morning to 6 inches of snow and it hasn't stopped yet. We woke the kids up at 7:30am because we had sacrament meeting this morning at 9am and we let them look at what Santa brought and open their stockings. 

Then we ate Christmas eggs, sausage and cinnamon rolls. 

We got ready for church. Mimi and Grandpa surprised us by meeting us there. We came home and Marcus went down for a nap while the kids opened the rest of their presents. The girls loved their new robes and Ellie was completely surprised by her new iPod and alarm clock. Lila loved the American Girl doll bed and ski outfit that was a last minute request. Andrew made a great exclamation of excitement over, "his new toy." I think it was a success! Well, I guess the girls were a little disappointed we didn't catch Santa with our new video doorbell. ;) We told them he doesn't use the front door, he lands on the roof and comes down in.

Unfortunately after that Andrew started throwing up and we began triage mode. I handled sick boy downstairs while Steve dealt with the baby in the toy room and the girls built Lila's new Shopkins house of legos upstairs in their room. Marcus did get to finally open his first Christmas presents. He mostly just enjoyed the paper . . . once the toy got going he thought it was pretty entertaining. ;)

It wasn't quite how I imagined the rest of the day, but I guess I'll be grateful we didn't have anywhere to be as it quietly snowed outside. Andrew is tuckered out and I'm trying to keep him awake a little longer in hopes that he can sleep all night. Steve is out snow blowing the drive and then we'll enjoy some ribs for dinner with the girls after which will play our new game Poison with them too. Merry Christmas!