Christmas 2012

We have had a lovely Christmas.. here are some ramblings

Finn took charge of the Advent Calendar Nana made for he and Zoe. It
first started with Hershey's Kisses in about 10 pockets, 1 for each of
them. We had a party of kids over.. at least it seemed like a party..
and at some point, Zoe asked if she could have one. I asked Zoe and
Finn what day it was, and went to check.. sure enough, that day still
had them.. but then I noticed that all of the others were empty.. I
asked Finn and he said innocently enough: "I ate them". I gave Zoe
the others and didn't fill it again. The rest of the time we just
moved the candy cane marker that came with the calendar. Finn did it
almost religiously.. and each day took on the name of the picture..
"Mom, is it duck day today".. sometimes it would take me a minute to
figure out just what he was talking about. The last one became named
as "fire day"... Finn was sure that it was a fire place and he
couldn't seem to wrap his head around, "No Finn, that is the baby in
the manger".. of course, that is meaningless to Finn, yes, I haven't
given my kids formal religious training.. we talk about all faiths,
all beliefs, not to single out any one in particular.

Since Christmas was "Fire day" Finn insisted we use put candles in the
fire place (I told him our chimney was not fire safe, no wood burning
fire mistakes in there again).. so we used the candle holders we made
(tissue paper + decoupage + mason jars). It glowed beautifully with
votive candles.

Both kids were so excited for Christmas. Zoe was too excited.. she
was ready to got to bed at 4:30, stating that the sooner they went to
bed, the sooner Santa would come. She kept encouraging Finn to get
ready for bed.. it took all I could do to keep them out of bed up to
the point where I thought they'd actually be tired enough to go to
sleep. Sure enough, 7am on the dot, Zoe was up and came to get me.
She and I got up early, brushed our hair dressed, and took a tour...
we waited for Finn.. he had been quite sick.. for a week and a half..
and finally got antibiotics for his sinus infection/chest cold just
Christmas Eve (yes, 1.5 hours in the walk-in clinic on Christmas Eve,
and I wasn't doing too great either, lack of sleep from his cold, the
cold he gave me, etc.). The kids opened pajamas (Angry Birds was the
theme) and dress up doll sticker books (warriors for Finn, girls in
costumes for Zoe)

The kids started on stockings, we called Nana and Grandpa, and took
out time with presents. The kids were fantastic.. we'd take breaks to
enjoy the presents.. not just running thru the opening.. even stopping
for breakfast mid way through to fuel us parents (homemade sausage
gravy, eggs, and biscuits, blueberry scones).. Finn ate very little,
Zoe a biscuit with jam.

The kids enjoyed their gifts.. including:
indigo converse shoes (high tops for Zoe, have hardly left Zoe's
feet, low one for Finn, yeah, I know, that's all they had in his
size), Razor Scooters, James Mayhew books, Laurence Anholt books,
Useborn book of Art masterpieces, lego table and lots of legos (Zoe is
enthralled by the Friends girl ones, and disdains playing with the boy
ones.. unless her girl is planning to marry a storm trooper or a
miner, which she does at times; Finn's favorite lego is the coyote
[dog], that came with the fireman set), hungry hippos game.
They also received the "Guess Who" game, which has been played more
than 12 times in the last 24 hours. There were fabulous construction
sets, building robot dinosaurs and trucks for Finn. Zoe received a
fresh supply of highlighters, paper (colored, florescent, white),
pens, cooking supplies, art scratch pages. Each has a new scarf and
some clothes; although I plan to buy most of that this weekend when
we travel to Seattle.. Zoe has started to disdain pink/purple in favor
of blue and I want her to pick it (she even scoffed at her new purple
water bottle, wanting Finn's blue one instead); Finn wants new pants
that reach his shoes, preferably without buttons!

The last gift was opened after lunch.. a Xbox with Kinect... although
Finn does find some of it fun (jumping is the best), Zoe loves the
dancing games.. turns out the Disney one is the best.. she doesn't
seem to enjoy the other as much. Zoe and I got up first thing before
the boys and played.. it was nice and I really look forward to doing
it more with her.. good exercise, good fun. Although if the Just
Dance version had "Gangnam Style", I'm sure we'd do it over and over!

Today Bruce got the nasty cold Finn and I shared, so we just enjoyed a
day in.. Zoe and Claire played with Finn, although I'm not sure their
bums ever hit the floor.. they scootered around our room, played lots
of Xbox, a little lego. Oddly enough, Claire and Zoe are in sync..
Claire even arrived in her new pink converse high tops.. its strange
how in sync the desires of these kids are.. things are just right when
they are right.

pictures on blog from phone now.. from good camera later..