It’s here! Christmas is here!!
(So is santa baby, it seems.)
This is us signing off for the holidays. We’ve been so blessed this year and we’re really thankful for all the friends we’ve made through the blog, the love and kindness we’ve received from all of you. Thanks for sharing our lives and we hope that in some small way, this little blog has brought some joy and laughter to yours.
Here’s wishing you a wonderful time filled with love and peace and joy.
Merry Christmas!!
This year just got a lot more christmassy. Why? For the first time in my life, I’ve got all (seriously, ALL!) the presents sorted and it’s still a full week till Christmas. If that doesn’t deserve some applause, I don’t know what does.
Every year, there’ll always be that one or two gifts that I forgot/couldn’t find and come the last weekend before Christmas, I’m back out on Orchard Road with my battle gloves fighting off all the last minute shoppers for that elusive last minute present and then after the whole song and dance, we’ll give up and fall back on getting some boring Egyptian cotton bath sheets.
Been there and I’m so done with that. The days of frenzied last minute Christmas shopping is over. Me and my pukey pregnant self will put sit back and enjoy the week before Christmas the way it’s supposed to be enjoyed.
I got the kids to sit down and we made a list of all the things we wanted to do from now till the end of the year, in order of importance.
1. Bake a cake (Truett’s list)
2. Dance Party (Kirsten’s list)
3. Picnic (Truett’s list)
4. Nap (My list)
5. Make a birthday card for Jesus (Kirsten’s list)
6. Nap (My list)
7. Build a snowman(??!!) (Kirsten’s list) – we’ll have to improvise
8. Eat cake (Finn’s list *according to Kirsten) – although quite easily done once we get #1 sorted
Btw, is it just me or are these two starting to have the same face?
9. Learn a magic trick (Truett’s list)
10. Nap (My list)
Ever since I was a kid, putting up the christmas tree has been huge. It’s a thing we all get to do together even though we’d pretty much make a mess hanging stuff randomly but my folks used to let us put up a shiny ball here and a sparkly dangly thing there just because. Decorating the tree every year was practically an event.
To see the kids so excited about putting up the tree, that just gets me all teary and happy.
On the day we decided to put up the tree, Truett beamed and said “I think today is going to be a wonderful day.” This kid gets my heart.
Is that a picture of the handiest little helpers or what? These guys are professional tree-putter-uppers, is what I’m saying.
Speaking of professional, one of these days I’m going to come home with a real tree with proper firs, all bushy and full, and it will smell divine. One day. One day that’s gonna happen but for now, a girl’s got to be practical and make the most of a tree she’s kept in a box for the past 11 months. And the next best thing is to surround it with real pine cones my mom picked from Yosemite 15 years ago.
Seriously, these cones have been surrounding every christmas tree since the day my mom brought them home and they are going to be passed down to Kirsten as family heirlooms. Some moms pass on jewellery but my daughter is getting this bunch of pine cones.
She’s clearly not convinced about the cones. Don’t worry, she’ll come around in a few years.
Just kidding. She’s admiring the tree. That’s her admiring face.
Hey Christmas, we’re ready for you!
Princess Dreams
We got Kirsten an Ariel princess dress for Christmas this year and she’s been wearing it for 2 days straight even though it’s a little too big for her. We found her watching The Little Mermaid on the iPad and belting out the tunes with way too much gusto, looking more pleased than we’ve ever seen her. I think it’s safe to say that all her dreams have come true this Christmas.
Skater Boy
Truett’s favorite gift this year? Spanking new skates from Grandma. His determination to master this is astounding. I think he’s fallen down over a hundred times in 2 days but he’s already managed to move from point to point unassisted.
I couldn’t help showing off a little so I whizzed past him on my blades and he was visibly impressed, like “wow, mommy can go really fast…” Hey, I’m milking my coolness factor points while they last.
Along for the Ride
Baby Finn still doesn’t quite understand the awesomeness that is Christmas so he’s just being his usual ridiculously good-looking self and soaking up all the attention he’s getting from everyone during all our Christmas parties.
How was your Christmas?
Our favoritest day in the entire year is finally here! Well, almost. In less than 12 hours, y’all…
Ever since the kids came along, we realized how special holiday traditions are. The things I remember most about the holidays as a kid are the tiniest moments like camping out in my parents’ room on Christmas eve, having bacon and pancakes on Christmas morning, then dressing up and going to church. So with the kids, we’re incorporating some of the old traditions and making some new ones.
We’re going to spend the next couple of days snuggling our babies in bed, singing carols, eating turkey, opening presents and basking in the Christmassy joy.
Have a merry, merry Christmas!
I like Christmas. In fact, I like it so much I dream of having it all year round, which explains why I listen to carols throughout the year. But the magic of Christmas is to celebrate it with other people, so it’s not much fun being the only nut feeling all festive in the middle of the year.
So when we were in Melbourne last week, we absolutely had to visit this charming little place called Miss Marples Tea Room. It’s pretty much like any other tea room, except they serve tea with a theme – Christmas in July.
It was ingenious, why wait till December when you could have it in July? Especially when it’s the middle of winter and the setting was perfect for some yuletide cheer.
We had to wait 40 minutes for a table but seriously, so worth it because stepping into the place, it felt exactly like Christmas.
There was a real fireplace with a crackling fire, all decked out with red and white stockings. Dangling from the ceiling were wreaths and garlands and mistletoe. The jingle of carols filled the room and the smell of Christmas was in the air. For once, I wasn’t the only one rocking out to Winter Wonderland in July.
And the desserts? Unbelievable.
They had all varieties of Christmassy food like roast turkey, eggnog, bread pudding and all kinds of sweet caramel creations. But we had just come from lunch so we decided to go for a sugar-induced coma with mugs of hot chocolate and a selection of desserts instead.
Not a bad way to spend a wintry afternoon.
We’ve really enjoyed our Christmas break this year. The kids have been in a spectacular mood all week and we’re all a little high from all the celebrating we’ve done. I’m taking a break from all that relaxing I’ve been doing and wrapping up with some final thoughts on the past several days.
Where’s Jesus, baby?
In explaining Christmas to the kids, we’ve told them a condensed version of the Nativity story and they know that it’s Jesus’ birthday. They were a little confused as to why they were receiving presents on someone else’s birthday but they’re not really fussed about it. At this point, they don’t care much for why they’re getting a present, because “LOOK A PRESENT FOR ME? WOW THANKS!”
Kirsten wanted to sing Happy Birthday to Jesus and so we did. When we were done, I asked her where Jesus was and she looked at me for a moment before patting her little belly. “In my stomach”, she said.
“Sweetie, I think you mean *heart*, right?”
“No, Jesus is not in my heart. Jesus is in my stomach.”
“I’d love to know how that happened, pumpkin. Wait, on second thoughts, I really don’t. I think we’re going to have to spend a little more time on the human anatomy next year ok.”
Hunger almost always works
This time every year, the husband takes a week’s leave from Christmas till after the New Year. It’s like our special family time week. This year, the kids still have school so we figured we’d let them go the school in the morning and bring them out for fun activities in the afternoon. Truett saw the husband in his shabby state yesterday morning and asked “When Truett and mei mei go to school, where is daddy and mommy going?” We didn’t really have any plans except breakfast so we told him as much.
He immediately replied with “I’m so hungry, I need to eat breakfast, if not I will be sick.” It almost worked, if not for the fact that he just had breakfast and would be getting more breakfast in school.
It’s the thought that counts
I love everything about Christmas except the gift-buying bit, which is like the bane of my existence. I love the idea of giving gifts and seeing the person’s face light up when they unwrap the item you lovingly picked out after spending all day fighting off hordes of people along Orchard Road to get. But choosing gifts has never been one of my many talents and I hardly ever get that reaction. In fact, the only face-lighting I’ve seen is from the kids and that’s probably because they don’t care if I got them popsicle sticks. Their delight is in the fact that we bought them something special, wrapped it up and wrote their name on it.
Over the years, many of the gifts I thought were brilliant and thoughtful has turned out to be meh so I’m through with all this gift-choosing. Next year, I’m spending all that time I’m supposed to be out buying presents on something far more productive, like watching movies or reading a book while sipping my latte. Everyone is getting gift vouchers so they can pick out their own presents. Done. Best gift idea ever.
Hello, Kitties!
On the topic of presents, Kirsten has been amassing an impressive collection of Hello Kitty merch this Christmas. She’s got a Hello Kitty bag, 2 Hello Kitty plushies, a Hello Kitty dollhouse, a Hello Kitty hooded towel, a Hello Kitty comb, a Hello Kitty bikini and a truckload of Hello Kitty clothes.
I have never been in possession of this many Hello Kitty items in my life and it’s rather disconcerting in that I’m starting to develop a soft spot for it (her? them?). I would normally have gone into an anaphylactic shock in the presence of such saccharine sweet pinkness but I guess it’s true, being a parent does change you.
