Lets start with Christmas Eve. We spent the day cleaning our house, trying to pull it together after a week of chaos. I don't know if it was the early mass start time or our laziness, but either way we lost track of time and had to rush around like crazy people trying to pull ourselves together for the 4:00pm mass, that I was told we needed to be at least thirty minutes early to. We got there thirty minutes early and didn't even get a look in the church before we were escorted to the Great Hall where the mass was being live streamed on a big screen tv. This was a huge room full of plastic chairs, which also quickly filled up. At this point I realized we were in for craziness and I was right. I left with Rowan screaming, and I do mean blood curdling screaming, DADDY, by the first reading. Grandma was in the back and we played with her, before trying our hand at mass in the plastic chairs again. We were all in the back, wandering around, trying to pull it together, after the homily. We couldn't hear or see a thing, so we cut our loses and chalk it up as a lesson learned. Still slightly unclear on the lesson, but we tried.
Grandma came back to our house with us and assisted in family photo taking while we waited for the Richards clan to come over for dinner. I hear they not only made it through the entire mass, but also got to sit in the actual sanctuary! The matching Christmas shirts were hand me downs from the Richards boys and wonderfully adorable.
Rowan's face in the picture below is my favorite thing ever!!
We had a lovely dinner with the Richards, then the boys dawned their matching jammies and got ready for Santa. We set out our cookies, milk, apples for the reindeer, and some Savory hot chocolate in case Santa was cold. The boys said their final good byes to Gary and put him in Zane's stocking to wait for Santa. The boys were in their rooms at normal time but I have no idea when Zane actually fell asleep. We waited quite some time before beginning work on the boys castle, only to hear Zane talking in his room. Christmas Eve prep really makes me miss our basement.
Precious!
See ya next year Gary!!
Everything was built, It's a Wonderful Life had been watched, and Zach and I headed to bed around 10:30, exhausted beyond belief, but ready for the excitement that awaited us in the morning.
It wasn't an earlier then normal morning, Zane got up at his normal time and saw the big surprise. He had a tough time waiting for brother, but managed to only look at a few stocking stuffers before Ro joined us.
What's a castle without a Knight costume, right??
Ro's music maker from the world trade store.
Santa knows Rowan so well, he put peanut butter, his favorite thing, in his stocking. This meant we had to take a break from presents for a "buddoo sandwich."
Santa brought Zane new rain boots again this year. Rowan was trying them on for size, with peanut butter sandwich in hand, hysterical!
We took our time with presents and the boys played with whatever they got for awhile before moving onto the next present. Present opening lasted a solid hour, which was lovely, unrushed, and by the grace of God did not end with tears this year.
The boys got right to work coloring their castle. Luckily Santa had brought new markers and crayons for everyone.
I had bought this Perry the Platypus while we were in Branson and forgot all about it until I was hiding new presents. Zane loved it and proclaimed it his favorite gift this afternoon.
I would say the knight costume was his favorite, since we spent literally all day playing knights, princess, and all things castle related. A whole new world of imagination was opened up today and it was great fun! Zane also got the stuffed owl he asked Santa for, which led to googling the Snowy owl, which apparently is endangered, and gorgeous! He got a leap reader to help with his reading which took all day to get working, but we finally were successful. Handcuffs that have already broken, a little panda, two board games, and all sorts of other small things that he loved we also among us loot!
As for Rowan's favorite gift, that would have to go to the little grill, which I think actually was a present for Zane, but Rowan was crazy about it! He pushed this little grill, which does not have wheels, all around the house. He had to push it everywhere because he could not grill unless he was within arms reach of daddy. Below was when Daddy tried to eat dinner while Rowan wanted to grill. Don't worry, Ro brought the grill to him and continued to serve us all hot dogs while daddy ate. It was adorable. "I cooking mamma." "Pay with me, pay with me!" Christmas with a two year old is amazingly fun. I realized I bought him way too many presents. He would have been set with just he peanut butter, but loved all his new things as well. Two new trains, a vacuum cleaner, a big Mickey, a cookie jar, a gas station for his car, his own little knight sword and shield and lot of other little things.
Yes, we wore our jammies all day long!
Mickey!!!
We debated doing something, or going somewhere, all day, but decided playing with our kids, giving them our undivided attention, all day, was the best thing imaginable. They never ran out of things to do, games to play, things to explore, or imaginary worlds to play in. Rowan swept with his vacuum cleaner, grilled, and jumped right into the sword fights. I got wonderful presents as well, two massage gift certificates, a new wallet, a necklace, a new work watch, and a home made frame that Zane made at school. Everyone napped and no one melted down, it was a house full of love and happiness all day. I could not have asked for a better Christmas. We are truly blessed beyond measure and I will cherish today for years to come!
