I'm glad it's over!

I'm a Scrooge... I know this, and I accept this. Well, I'm not a Scrooge about my own immediate family and our celebrating... I'm Scroogish about all the other nonsense we put ourselves through for our extended family's sake... only to be spat on once again.

Okay, Scrooge aside, we had a nice Christmas just the 5 of us. We got up at a reasonable time, attended the 8:00am Mass (which for our church was practically empty), and came home for breakfast and a few gifts! We tried to take some pictures (which didn't go well), but after a hearty meal it was time for the annual shredding of wrapping paper. As usual we had a very modest gift exchange... but the delight was very apparent with the boys... who enjoyed a new set of PJ's (including a homemade fleece robe) and slippers, and LEGO's (their first real set). Also a relative sent them each a horse (which was a huge hit). Nothing needed batteries, nothing had flashing lights or made any noise on their own, and all needed imagination!

Sidenote: I had no idea that the robe would be immediately transformed into a Jedi Robe!

After all was picked up and the boys headed to their rooms for some intense Jedi Lego barn yard antics, Daddio and I headed into the kitchen for several hours of cooking.

On the menu: roasted duck, homemade cornbread dressing, mashed sweet potatoes, dinner biscuits, and spice cake (we always do a birthday cake for Jesus).

That evening we were to have family guests, and were quite excited to try out all these lovely dishes. Unfortunately our guests decided not to show up... and we enjoyed the meal on our own. It was delicious! We have a second duck waiting for another lovely opportunity to enjoy such a tasty meal!

While our time was lovely, dealing with our relations really turned out poorly. I'm glad that portion of our Christmas season is over. Now we get to enjoy our children, our home, and our food in peace.

Jolly Old Saint Nick

Patrick at Creative Minority Report has a post up about first communion preparations at this parish. Here's a sample:

"Then the children proceeded to the sanctuary right in front of the altar where they began a song that made the first little diddy seem like a Schubert composition. This song had more hand motions than a three day conference for the hearing impaired. Then they started a clappin'! Then they started a hootin' and hollerin' punching their fists Arsenio Hall style "Woo Woo! Jesus!" clap clap clap "Woo Woo! Jesus!"

Hilarious! As I posted previously, we opted out of the group instruction for Bobcat, and it's not half as bad at our parish (but they do require the making of felt banners... barf).

I got this wonderful historical gem from one of the commenters:

"At the Council of Nicea, Arius was TKO'd by another bishop, who was outraged by his heresy. What I mean is, he was slapped hard right across the kisser! The emperor threw the misbehaving bishop in jail. That night, the emperor had a dream, seeing that bishop resplendent in his episcopal robes and holding the Book of Gospels. Awakened and alarmed, he called his guards to accompany him to the dungeon. There they found this "disrespectful" bishop, just as the emperor saw him in his dream. The bishop was immediately released.That naughty bishop was none other than Nicholas of Myra. That's right... Jolly old St Nick cold-cocked a heretic!"

Any suggestions on how we can incorporate this story into our family's Christmas festivities?

On the Fourth Day of Christmas

--Our DVR unit is totally broken rendering us completely unable to view TV in the master bedroom. And it will be a few days before they can have another device sent to us... This totally sucks since this is the only place that we watch TV, after the kids are in bed and we are winding down our evening... OH AND THAT MEANS NO BASKETBALL CAN BE RECORDED AND WATCHED LATER! This is a big problem!

--On our outing to the local driving range I was terrible. I was completely out of sorts. Frustration and sore muscles (from all the scooter riding, sad really) had my swing all wonky. Large clumps of dirt and grass flew further than some of the golf balls, pathetic.

--Leaving the driving range I stepped in dog doo, which I didn't realize, tracking it into the SUV, and then on to my jeans when I crossed my leg under the other... and of course on to seat (thank goodness they're leather, and it cleaned right up).

--Daddio picked up a new daily wear/camping watch for me! It's PINK and it was on sale too!! $12, gotta love Kohls!

--I finally found a recipe for meatloaf that turned out tasty enough that I would eat it (I'm not a big fan of meatloaf, and Daddio is... so it took a while for me to find something that I liked as well).

On the Third Day of Christmas

To be honest, it was pretty much just like yesterday. It started off slow, we did some running around (Daddio needed golf shoes), and then hit another park with a concrete skate area. At this particular park, they have a roller hockey rink that no one was using which made the perfect place to unleash the little llamas with their scooters.

Have I mentioned how wonderful it is to have these little contraptions that fold up in one easy motion and fit easily into the back of the beast so that they can come with us when ever we so choose... trust me when I say that having those Razors in the back of the car are a perfect incentive to have well mannered boys while we run some not always fun errands!

Then home again for a late nap...

And because today happens to be the last Thursday of the month... a few of the moms from our homeschool group are getting together for our monthly Mom's Night Out. A lovely cup of hot apple cider, and then maybe a frothy delight top of the evening...

All in all, a good day!

On the Second Day of Christmas

The Llamas spent the afternoon on scooters... even Daddio and Mama had their fair share of riding... It was pretty entertaining actually. Bobcat really has the hang of it. What Bubba lacks in ability he makes up for with fierce determination. And little Snookie, well, something always seems to be wrong with his scooter... if you ask him that is. Towards the end of the afternoon, though, he was really picking up speed and coasting from time to time.

On the First Day of Christmas

Good day, and Happy Birthday Baby Jesus!

Today is the first day of Christmas, which means I will joyfully listen to Christmas music... of course come morning none will be played on the radio, so my CD's and my own singing will fill these walls (my poor children)... I'm totally hoping to score a Noel CD on sale!

Our tree went up on Friday (the 21st, as mentioned previously), and how long will it stay up??? Well, my good readers, till the last day of Christmas Proper (check out your missals)... drum roll please... January 13th, the baptism of our Lord. Usually we take it down after Epiphany, you know the 12th day of Christmas... but we're goin' with the actual Christmas season this year.

So, what was under said tree for the little llamas of the house... well they each got a scooter (we're going to work on balance before we attempt bikes again), each a new flashlight (shock resistant of course) for camping, and transformer underpants (no Christmas is complete without either underpants or socks, right?).

(It only took 50 tries this morning after Mass to capture this image!)

From the Llama family to yours, may this be a blessed Christmas season!

Snaggletooth Christmas Part 2

When it rains it pours. Tonight before bed, Bobcat lost two more teeth (bottom row, on either side of the two in the middle which are permanent), and Snookie lost the other bottom center tooth next to the one he lost on Thursday. Bubba and Bobcat both have one more loose on top which will probably go within a week or two. They are so tickled by the resulting speech impediments.

Snaggletooth Christmas

Everyone has a hole in their head today. (And their pants, evidently. Sad-lookin' little ragamuffins, aren't they?) Snookie lost his very first tooth on Thursday. Sadly, we weren't here for it. My mom was babysitting and Snookie used the loose tooth as an excuse to get out of bed and complain. Why do grandmothers always fall for these lame excuses? She felt sorry that it was bothering him so she helped him take it out. I don't believe it really needed to come out at that moment. Kind of a bummer that we missed out on his first tooth. My mom is so gullible. Anyway, I digress. He's pretty excited to have joined the big boys' club.

And Bubba lost his third tooth (the first one from the top row) before church this morning. He's very amused by his own lisp. Bobcat's top tooth has been gone for months, surely the replacement is on the way soon.

And that is a Christmas tree you see there. Who says procrastination doesn't pay? If you wait until December 21st, the trees are on super sale. This one is very high quality, and pre-lit. I do prefer colored lights, and lots of them, but you just can't beat the convenience. Considering that we have to rearrange the furniture to accommodate the tree, we just can't seem to get motivated. We put it up Friday and decorated Saturday. Here's a fun game - click on the first image above for a larger version and play "Count the Santa's". Heh heh. I know there are varying degrees of Santa-ism among very devout and God-fearing people. I'm not criticizing anyone who enjoys the fantasy, but it's just not our thing.

Anyway, we pushed through our laziness and got it all done. We've even wrapped all the gifts, and the lights are up on the roof. (I should replace this one burned out bulb that I didn't notice until last night. I thought I had checked them all on ground level. Grrr. We shall see if scrupulosity prevails over sloth. So many vices to choose from...) It's ironic that we had more Christmas cheer before we had children. But now that the work is done, I'm glad, and the house does look nice. And smells great too, as the Llama is baking cookies today. Here's a close-up of our favorite ornament.

Christmas Shoes

Does anyone else get annoyed by that song? I think it's ridiculous.

We're not totally grinchy though, we put up some decorations this weekend. Everything but the tree. We don't have a tree, actually - we did a real one last year, and gave away our old fake one. I'm waiting to find a nice pre-lit tree on sale closer to the 25th. I was going to stick to our "Penitential Advent" theme until the 24th, but when I came home Friday, MommaLlama had taken the decorations out of the closet. It's been a rough week, she needed to see something cheerful. So we're pseudo-Christmasy. Actually, I heard on the radio that the Vatican Christmas tree went up last week. So I guess if the pope is ready to decorate then we can too.

We also wanted to set up the nativity because we got our new piece in. The nativity scene was always very important in my family when I was growing up. We had a beautiful porcelain set that my grandmother actually made herself, and it was always displayed prominently. I started a set for us the year we were married. I wanted something very nice, heirloom quality. I chose Lenox "China Jewels". I started with just the holy family and a shepherd, and have added a new piece or two every year since then. Unfortunately, it's been retired this year, so from now on I'll have to buy second hand pieces on eBay to complete the set. I got the donkey this year, he arrived on Friday. My first ever eBay purchase, and actually it was fairly priced and in excellent condition. I have all the important pieces, but there are a few more animals out there I would like to have. You should see the elephant (presumably ridden by one of the Magi). It's enormous and intricately detailed and has a lot of colorful decoration on the saddle. I should have bought it when I saw it in a store in 2000, but it seemed out of place with our small collection. Now it's going for about $350 on eBay. Yikes.



Here are a few photos, per Nicole's request. This is the whole set.



This is a close-up of our 2007 addition, the donkey. He was actually mentioned in the bible, if you're a stickler for historical accuracy.



These are two of my favorite pieces, the standing camel (2005) and the palm tree (2004). There's also a kneeling camel that I want to add someday.