Christmas is a time of late nights spent wrapping presents, filling stockings, plugging in the tree and trying to slow down the adrenaline so you can get a few hours of quality sleep before you are awoken by the excitement of your 3 year old.
Christmas is a time to look around the room and know that you belong exactly where you are. Surrounded by food, cookies, toys and family.
Christmas is a time for reflection. Reflection at how far we have come in a year, reflection at how lucky we are, reflection for the joy that is real the reason for the season.
Christmas brings with it all these activities that we feel we must fit in before the calendar states Dec 25th. It is insane the amount of exhaustion Christmas brings with it and yet I am always sad to take down the tree. We didn't get in half of what I would have liked this Christmas season but thankfully the family time continues with the Schaber and Hutchinson gatherings to come. We have so much to be thankful for this year and it doesn't escape me that each day is as special as Christmas morn, the hard part can be finding the joy in everyday afterwards.
Our Christmas started off with a delirious baby girl who caught her brothers cold and was up until 2:30 a.m. Christmas eve eve. I had to peel myself out of bed to work, a shift I sorely regretted picking up at 5:00 a.m. and I was happy to let the boys attend the annual cousins party alone as our girl was desperately clingy and so beyond tired that she needed a quiet house and some mommy snuggles.
She and I finally got a quality nap in and I was so happy to go to her crib and see life in her eyes again. We quickly got ready and went to the 3:00 p.m. service which was packed with families old and new. It was the family service and it was fabulous. The music was beautiful. Silent night sung in the dark with lighted candles lining the aisles was enough to make my knees weak with adoration and awe. That baby in the manger was very real to me that afternoon as I held my own. We all met up for the annual immediate Hutchies quiet Christmas eve gathering which turns out was everything but quiet with 2 children this year. Riley was less than gracious about his gifts and tore through them with reckless abandon barely giving them a second glance and asking after each if there was more. Not our proudest parent moment but it's the age and the seriously insufficient amount of sleep our boy had leading up to the night that didn't help anything. Eventually Daddy and Lyssa Lu had to get home to bed and we were able to play Bingo which Riley rocked the house on. That boy could glance at his card and immediately know when the card was called if he had that spot to fill with a decade old M&M. Thankfully Lyssa Lu went to bed a bit easier Christmas Eve and we were able to stuff, literally stuff the stockings and set up the santa gifts.
It was rather weird being up before the sun and opening presents in the dark but the insane amount of lights on the tree and a high ISO helped with a few pictures of our children. They were both happy with their Santa gifts and in a matter of minutes Lyssa Lu was pulling herself up to the standing position and beaming wide and proud at her newest accomplishment just a week or so after finally crawling. Sister is making up some ground and it is cute watching her little butt scoot around, very fast, after whatever her heart desires...which is usually the dog bowls.
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| Sweet baby wearing the same pj's Riley did 3 years ago |
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| "I know him!" |
The rest of the day was the usual blur of Theisen's, an insane amount of gifts and torn wrapping paper and finally dinner before the early exit from G'ma Carols for naps and quiet time. We napped, hard and then we went our separate ways. The boys headed up north and the girls headed to my Aunt's for the most cozy Christmas dinner with the fancy china from my Great Grandma Schaber. It was quaint, fancy, warm and perfect. My Aunt Sandy is fabulous from head to toe and she and my Uncle were the most gracious hosts of the impromptu dinner and Christmas cozies time. After all, a big dinner and Christmas cozies (a polite way of saying sweats and comfy shirts) is definitely a sign that it's Christmas.
We finally crashed at home later and awoke to a quiet, peaceful, clean yet new toy messy kind of house and we escaped quickly back to my parents house to bake cookies before naps and because I still hadn't had enough of my family-they made their way back to my house for a pizza party dinner later that night. I went to bed filled up full and happy.
It wasn't a perfect Christmas, there was no family videos, no Clue or Sequence, no late night candlelit service, no clear kids noses or the silence that only comes with kids who don't have coughs. I think it's a bit unreal with 2 young children to expect perfection or even to strive for it but all in all it was good.
We are a bit shaken by the independence and attitude of Riley since we returned from Vegas. The old adage that the terrible 2's is actually the terrible 3's is rearing it's ugly face. The nonchalant behavior from him has been frightening and puzzling to us. I assumed he was lashing out because we left for a few days, turns out watching Kung Fu Panda was at the root of our problem. It suddenly dawned on Derrick that his hitting and desire to "fight" may or may not have been stemming from that stupid cartoon. While we tackle how to weather and better this storm the cartoons are strictly Clifford, Zaboo and WordWorld. Obviously we cannot blame this sudden shift in character entirely on Po and his dragon warriors, we are just going to have to take each day as they come assessing everything carefully and figuring out what will work to help him see right and wrong. This by far has been the biggest challenge we have come across in our short 3.5 years of parenting. He will tell me logically and calmly with his words before bed exactly why he was frustrated and I can clearly see why he lashed out but it's the getting him to understand that in the heat of the moment (which usually is nothing to be heated up about) that he has to act respectfully and lovingly is a whole different story. He is somewhere between toddlerhood and big boy and trying desperately to find his own way on his own. This is hard and will be a true test to all of us. God-willing this is short lived and our sweet, easy boy is back in no time.
Christmas is a time for Christmas music...the real stuff, not the Mariah Carey versions of "All I want." I am talking about "Christmas makes me cry" by Matthew West and Mandisa, "Christ is come" Big Daddy Weave, "Mary did you now?" Kathy Mattea and many others that I can't name but belted out in the car.
Christmas is a time to re-group, re-energize, re-strategize and remember what brought us here to start with.
Merry Christmas from our little family to yours! and sorry about the insane amount of pics!
