Day 25

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

Our day started at 5 again this morning. :) Well, Charlie started shouting to be let out of bed at 4:55. Michael went in and gave the boys their pacifiers and turned on their music which bought us about 10 minutes. We finally went in and got the boys. I was greeted by this face. . .

We went down the hall. . .I think Lucy had just been lying in her bed waiting for us to get up! We headed into the living room and saw all that Santa had brought.

She squealed with excitement!

This little girl loves stocking stuffers!

So do these boys! We had to hide all the snacks in their stockings so they would quit eating them! Every time you turn around, Charlie was asking for another cookie!

Fun in the ball pit!

They like sending the cars down the ramp

We played a while and then had breakfast together.

The boys shared their bananas with each other. :)

Peekaboo!

Yesterday when the kids had been in the living room, Lucy told the boys, "You can't open these presents until Christmas Day! We will open them at 7 AM!" So this morning she kept asking and kept asking, "Is it 7 yet?" Well, it was probably about 7:20 when we finished up with breakfast and then we went to open presents.

Alex was much more interested in the boxes than what was in them. He wanted to stand in them  .. . 

And climb on them

Once I got his school bus open though, he didn't want anything to do with anything else!

Once their gifts were open, we headed back to play with our toys. (Michael and I still have wrapped presents under the tree!) Charlie and Alex gave Lucy a Doc McStuffins playhouse which she has enjoyed all day. 

Alex read a little bit this afternoon. . . 

And Charlie is still begging for cookies!

Day 24

Merry Christmas Eve!! It's 9 PM and the kids are asleep, breakfast casserole is mixed and ready to cook in the morning, Santa has come, and Mom and Dad are in bed! Woohoo!!! Guess what time we were up this morning . .. yup, 5 AM! Lucy and I started making our Christmas cookies at about 9 AM. (Yes, that was when the boys laid down for their morning nap!)

My little cookie expert

We watched some TV until the boys woke up and while the cookies cooled. While we iced the cookies, the boys taste-tested them for us. (Yes, they were dairy free!) The definitely approved and we had to hide the rest of them so they would quit asking for more.

Decorating with sprinkles

Excited for Santa!!

Grammy and Aunt Nae came over to watch the kids while Michael and I went to church for our drop-in communion service. Neither church we serve has anything on Christmas Eve and Michael felt like there should be something. So this gave everyone an opportunity to come as they had time to stop and take five minutes out of their day to pause and remember the reason for all our celebration. We had a good turnout and many told Michael how meaningful they felt this was. I didn't see how many people were there since I was playing but I think we will probably do this again next year since it was well received.

For the rest of the afternoon, the kids played together. One of their new favorite games is to tackle each other. As you can see, Alex wasn't too excited this time around . . .

Charlie deciding to play with his toys using his feet!

Everyone was pleasant which was a nice change from yesterday! We decided this morning that we were not going to go to a Christmas Eve service this year. The kids had sat through a Sunday evening Christmas service and knowing their track record, Michael and I both felt that this year would be more of a headache than a meaningful Christmas experience. We spent some time instead though talking at home and remembering what Christmas is all about. Lucy reenacted the Christmas story with her nativity and then Michael talked a little about the meaning of Christmas. We said a prayer and sang "Joy to the World." The boys sat fairly well but Lucy was really engaged and hopefully something stuck with her.

The boys then let us know that staying home from church was the right decision. Around 5:00, they announced it was time to finish for the day. We quickly had dinner, bath and then it was time for bed. Lucy quickly followed - she was tired since she didn't have a nap today. Before bed though, she wanted hot chocolate with whipped cream (or Whoop cream as she calls it!). Once the whipped cream was gone though, she was done with her drink. It took her only about 10 minutes to fall asleep for good. Santa got to work after that and everything is ready for everyone in the morning!

Well, I am going to take advantage of this early bedtime since 5 AM will be here early! From our family to yours, we wish you a very MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

Day 23

Whew . . .can it really be Christmas Eve Eve?? Where does the time go? This 5 AM wake up call is getting old, but I don't know how to fix it. It doesn't matter if we go to be early or late, it's still the same time every day! We were out at breakfast this morning around 9 AM with Gramma and Pappy and the boys just had to leave because they were ready for nap. Of course, by the time we got home, they decided they no longer wanted to nap. I let them fuss in their beds for about 30 minutes before I gave up. We ran to the grocery store where the boys ate an entire container of Puffs as we tried to make it through the store. Then we came home, ate lunch, and thankfully, everyone took a 2 hour nap. When the boys woke up though, they were in a clingy, fussy mood. They spent the rest of the evening going back and forth between screaming and then suddenly being fine. I was thankful to see bedtime come! And then Miss Lucy, well . . . let's just say she's lucky that Christmas Eve is tomorrow because if Santa saw too many more days like today, he would have to start returning gifts! Sigh . . . .being a parent at Christmas is so fun and so frustrating all at the same time! All this excitement and lack of routine doesn't always bring out the best in my children!

Tonight, I have no new pictures of today. Believe me, you don't want to see today anyway! But here are a few to tide you over until tomorrow . ..

Photos from the park

Yesterday while the boys were watching Mickey Mouse, I looked over and saw this . .. yes, that is his shirt down by his waist. I think he got tired of having that wet neck from all his drooling so he pulled his arms out!

Day 22

Today was a busy day! Of course, we were up again at 5:00! We had breakfast and a church service at Union followed by church at Concord. Then we came home where all kids took a 3 hour nap after lunch. Back to Union for an evening service and then home for bed. It was a nice day overall but I am looking forward to a somewhat calmer day tomorrow!

Michael got the boys dressed this morning while I was taking a shower. He had to leave after that to run get some ink for the printer. (That's what happens when you wait until Sunday morning to print your sermon - it always runs out of ink!) I came out into the living room and found this. . .

Yes, the boys were fully dressed from the waist up, but their pants were no where in sight. Apparently this is how they wanted to be dressed. They ran around like this all morning but and fussed like crazy when it was time to put their pants back on for church! But here are a few more pictures for you. . .

Don't even think about making me put those pants back on!

This face. .. seriously . ..  cutest kid ever!

And of course, my beautiful girl was there in the mix too. She preferred to stay fully dressed. :)

Day 21

Today was a long day. These children . . .oh my. The day started again at 5 AM, and by 9:00, the boys were screaming for nap time. They did take a two hour nap though . . . And then after lunch, the destruction began. The boys tore apart all of the Rubbermaid cabinets again and then would not stop moving the baby gate that blocks the TV cabinet. You couldn't turn around before they had it open and were throwing DVDs everywhere. When I went and sat in front of the cabinet, they just kept hitting me. I reached my limit, so we jumped in the car and went to the park. Michael was gone to visit a church member in the hospital and I knew it was crazy to take the kids all by myself, but I couldn't stay at home any more.

There are two sections of the park in downtown Lewisville. There is a place with slides and then another with swings. Fortunately, the slide section is a small area that has a wall around it so it wasn't too hard to contain the boys. Lucy had a great time going down all the slides and the boys ran all around. I spent all of my time going back and forth from boy to boy, stopping them from climbing up the slides or taking mulch out of their hands before they ate it or wiping their face after they smeared dirt all over it .. .  oh well. They were laughing and having a good time. And it was so nice outside - we didn't even need jackets!

As you can tell from the videos, Michael showed up just in time to go swing. :) Everyone had a good time. If you watch closely, you'll see that Alex figured out how to swing himself!!

We came home from our fun at the park and I thought everyone would easily take a nap. It only took Lucy about 5 minutes to fall asleep but the boys flat out refused. After an hour and a half of trying to make them sleep, I gave up. Of course, for the rest of the afternoon they were fussy and crabby and just all around unpleasant. And destructive. Books have been torn apart - in fact, we have taken out all toys and books from the room except for about 3 things. Michael and Lucy left around 5 to go caroling with a group from church and so I fed the boys, gave them a bath and then they were beating on the door, saying "Night Night! Night Night!" and went down for the evening at 5:55. Sigh . . .I guess we'll see 5 AM again tomorrow. At least it is a full day of church activities so we will stay busy away from home!

Day 20

Today was the first day of Christmas break for Lucy and me. The boys woke up early again - I'm getting a little tired of 5 AM, to be honest! Well, by 8:00 this morning, I knew we had to get out of the house. The boys had already emptied out all of the rubbermaid drawers, turned over the kitchen, crawled behind the recliner to knock down and unplug the wireless router and were on to trying to pull the playstation down into the floor. So we loaded up the car and took the kids to the children's museum of Winston-Salem. We had a lot of fun and will likely upgrade to a membership status. I can foresee many trips to get our wiggles out this winter!!

Alex had the best time crawling through the tree trunk tunnel

I think both boys would have spent hours just crawling back and forth!

Then we discovered the music-making troll bridge!

The boys were excited to row the boat.

I don't think that Lucy was too confident in the boys' rowing skills because she put on her life vest! ;)

Excited to drive the truck

Daddy walked them through how to make doughnuts

It's hard to see how excited they are, but it was the best part of the day when the doughnuts fell down!

I think Charlie was disappointed that they were only play doughnuts. 

Leave it to Charlie to find a spoon!

Alex liked playing cashier in the grocery store.

Mmmm .. . ice cream!

Grammy and Poppa came out this evening to keep the boys and Lucy took Mommy and Daddy to see the lights at Tanglewood.

Lucy liked watching the reindeer jump over the cars.

When you roll the windows down here, you can hear the bells play.

Santa and his sleigh

It was a busy day . . now lets hope that the little ones will sleep a little later in the morning!!