Getting Ready for Christmas

Last Thursday was the official first day of the kids' winter break and Curtis's time off from work as well. Jack was so excited to watch the extended versions of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, that he planned for us to watch all of the Hobbit movies on Thursday and all of The Lord of the Rings movies on Friday. He invited his girlfriend, Morgan, over to watch with us. I would have much rather watched these AFTER Christmas because I still wasn't done shopping and getting ready, but we did it anyway and we enjoyed watching them together. It made for really long days but we took little breaks here and there. Like on Thursday we took Milo to get his last round of puppy vaccines. Then in the evening we went to dinner with Curtis's coworker and his wife and little 1 1/2 yr old girl. This coworker lives in Meridian but his wife's family lives here in Pasco, so they were here for Christmas. We enjoyed visiting with them. I told Jack that if he ever wants to do a movie marathon again it needs to be AFTER Christmas. I was trying to sit and enjoy the movies but also having anxiety about needing to get things done. We were real couch potatoes those two days!

Nikki came into town Saturday morning with her friend Cyrus to spend Christmas with us. We were a little worried because Friday the Snoqualmie Pass that she would need to drive over was shut down for a while because of snow and chains were required. Thankfully by Saturday morning it was clear and she didn't need to buy chains. She was having some trouble with her car and Curtis took the afternoon to help her with it. She needs a new oil pan for Jiffy Lube to be willing to change her oil for her but she doesn't have the money to do that right now. Curtis showed her how to change her own oil and bought her some stuff to help with that. She was very grateful.

While they were working on car stuff, I decided I better go get my shopping done. I really hadn't wanted to wait until two days before Christmas to do this, especially since I needed to go to the mall, but I did it anyway and Charlotte came with me. She was so excited to come shopping at the mall and to have some one on one time with me. We stopped at JC Penney first to find some cologne for Curtis. Because I bought something from them, they handed us out reward cards where we could win something. The lady gave one to me and to Charlotte. One was a $10 of coupon to come back shopping after Christmas and the other were some free diamonds! Even though I had opened the diamond coupon, I let Charlotte pick something out for herself. She picked a beautiful cross because she knew it had to do with Jesus. At first, she wanted to give it away but we ended up wrapping it up so she could open it on Christmas. She also helped me pick out a toy remote control unicorn for Alice and some scented soaps from Bath and Body Works (some for Nikki and some for us). And because she was hungry, we stopped to get some cinnamon sugar pretzel bites and a pizza pretzel. They were really yummy! I also stopped in to see my friend Shannon who works at Kay Jewelers. They were super busy! Charlotte had wanted some cotton candy from a machine that makes them right in front of you and in different shapes, but I couldn't bring myself to pay $10 for sugar 😂 so we opted for the 50 cent candy machines. It satisfied her. We loved this time together.

Eating her cinnamon sugar pretzel bites. We shared.

Nikki was so tired that she ended up going to take a nap around 6pm and slept through the night. Since she was sleeping, we decided we better get some gift wrapping done since the only thing I had wrapped so far were pajamas and Curtis's gifts. We had a lot to do. We ended up staying up until 1:00 am and still weren't finished. Thankfully we had one more day to get it done. Curtis and I made omelets and hashbrowns and orange juice for breakfast Sunday morning. Then we went to church services while Nikki and Cyrus stayed home. Our ward does something different with the choir because it's hard to get people to choir practice. They have an "instant choir". They passed out a little paper with the singing parts on it and it's a song everyone knows, this time "Joy to the World". So, anyone can come up and sing that wants to without having gone to any practices. Usually I'm the only one from our family, but this time Curtis and the girls went up with me! And then the girls stayed up there to sing a number with the primary. We only had Sacrament meeting that day but we visited with a few friends after the meeting and then headed back home.

We had cheese, ham lunch meat, onions and bacon for toppings.

This is what it looks like right before rolling it up.

Curtis had started cooking our Zuppa Toscana soup before going to church so that we wouldn't have to do much afterwards. However, I wanted to make some rolls to go with the soup and to bake our pumpkin pie for Christmas day. Curtis, Jack, Nikki and Cyrus played some games while I baked. The girls jumped in to help toward the end.

Nikki, Cyrus, Jack, Curtis playing Settlers of Catan.

I had a little leftover dough from the pie crust and so I let Charlotte make some cutouts to go on top. Two stars and a gingerbread man.

Watching the pie bake.

Zuppa Toscana and warm rolls. It was a delicious Christmas Eve dinner.

The girls especially loved the rolls. Alice doesn't like that flavor of soup, so she just ate rolls.

The pie when it was done baking. I was really enjoying doing a bunch of baking.

We had wanted to make homemade gingerbread houses as an activity, but we ran out of time to do that. Instead, we made cookies. Curtis mixed up the dough for me and had to chill it until after dinner. The girls then helped me cut out our gingerbread cookies. We were going to make icing to decorate them but never got around to it and decided we liked them well enough without icing.

The night ended with driving to see some Christmas lights, opening the pajama gifts, reading "The Night Before Christmas", and watching the movie "White Christmas". By the time we finished and had the girls in bed it was 10pm and we still had gift wrapping and prepping to do. It was another late night and we didn't get to bed until after midnight, but we were ready for Christmas now.

Wearing their Christmas jammies, which aren't actually Christmas themed. They want to be able to wear them all year round.

Reading "The Night Before Christmas".

Santa stopped by right before we went to bed and got everything ready for Christmas.

A Lot Going On For Alice

Monday afternoon was the day of Alice's dental appointment to get two fillings and either a baby root canal or tooth extraction. Fortunately, the dentist decided to just extract the tooth because that's what we wanted to do. It was a lot cheaper and a lot less to go through. This was a baby tooth that would normally come out around age 10. She'll be without it for a few years but that's fine. Her appointment was at 3:00pm and so I picked her up early from school to take her over. Charlotte rode the bus home. She was so calm and just the perfect patient for them. The assistants and the dentist were very impressed with how well she did. It sure helps to have Disney+ to watch along with headphones.

She loves wearing dresses and chose to wear this one to school that day. Probably not the best choice to wear a white dress for a procedure.

They gave her nitrous to help calm her also, but I honestly don't think she would have needed it.

I gave her some Ibuprofen after we got home so that she wouldn't have pain when the numbing meds wore off. She did so great and never complained about anything. Later that same night we let the girls open their Christmas pajamas early because Charlotte really wanted to wear them to school on Wednesday for their special pajama and movie day. Charlotte's current pajamas have holes in the knees or she doesn't like them. She later had the idea that we could wash and rewrap them after they wore them on Wednesday so they could unwrap pjs with Garrett, Jack and Nikki.

Charlotte loves her doggy pajamas and I think Alice likes her unicorn pajamas but it was hard to tell when she first opened them. We'll get a picture with them wearing them on Christmas Eve.

The very next morning, Alice wakes up with pink eye but it's not as bad as Charlotte's. Her left eye was a little pink and puffy and there was a little gunk on the eyelashes. I gave her eye drops and she stayed home from school that day. I wasn't totally convinced that she actually had pink eye because she had cleaned her eye off before I saw it and not long after the eye drops her eye looked normal, but we're doing the drops just in case since Charlotte for sure just had it. Better safe than sorry. I just hope we have enough drops for both girls to get a full dose. I tried calling our old pediatrician in Nampa to see about getting another prescription because Alice doesn't have a new pediatrician yet but he said he couldn't do that now that we're in Washington. They said to take her to the quick care but I don't think that would work because her eye looks normal already, so I'm hoping these drops last. The last day for Alice to take them is Christmas. It's not the best way to start off her birthday week but at least she already had her party.

Tuesday after school, Jack's friend Eli and his mom stopped by dressed as Santa and his elf and brought us a gift. They are such a fun family. I love it! Eli was dressed as Santa and his mom was the elf. I love this gift idea, fun and useful. 

This was the gift they brought, a roll of wrapping paper and tape with a message that said "Wishing you a season wrapped up in the spirit of joy! Merry Christmas". Jack used some paper to wrap gifts for his friends that same night.

Alice missed her Christmas party on Tuesday but she made it to school on Wednesday for the final half day before the break. Since her actual birthday is on Friday and during the winter break, we brought in birthday donuts for her class after they watched "The Polar Express" on Wednesday. I was excited to find mini donuts that were decorated like the big ones because I didn't want to buy big ones. The kids loved them.

Alice and her teacher getting ready to sing "Happy Birthday".

I got out of the house Wednesday afternoon to do some Christmas shopping and when I returned I found that my ministering sister had brought me a cute little treat.

A cute reindeer chocolate bar.

Today has been a relaxed day. Jack made plans for us the watch "The Hobbit" movies today and "The Lord of the Rings" tomorrow. He invited his girlfriend, Morgan, over to watch with us because she has never seen them. We started around 8:30 this morning after I made German pancakes for breakfast. We paused our movie to take Milo to the vet this afternoon to get his final puppy vaccination. I have been working on blogging during the movies, so I feel like I got something accomplished instead of just sitting here all day. Curtis and I will be taking another break to go to dinner with a coworker and his wife who are in town. We'll be in the middle of the last movie and will finish when we get back. Yay, I'm finally caught up on blogging. I probably forgot some stuff that I originally wanted to blog about but oh well. That's what happens when life gets too busy. I have been stressing out about getting Christmas shopping done. I think we're just about there but watching these movies is not helping me to get that done. I might have to miss some tomorrow so I can get it finished.

Alice's Birthday Party

Last Saturday was also the same day that we let Alice have a friends party for her upcoming birthday. It was the first time she was able to do one because it's always so busy this time of year. She helped me pick out decorations and then we drove around to most of the friends to drop off their invitations last Wednesday. About half of them are friends from church. One is the neighbor friend who lives behind us. I let her invite 7 friends. Five of them were able to come, and of course Charlotte. I spend a lot of money on decorations and party favors. Maybe next time I will just let her have the party at a trampoline park or something. It probably cost around the same.

The party started at 1:30 and ended at 3:30. Originally I was just going to have snacks and dessert, but Alice really wanted to have pizza also. So, last minute we decided to get pizza as well. Curtis went to help someone in our ward with hooking up some plumbing in their kitchen, so I was left alone to get things ready with the help of the girls and Garrett. As usual, everything took longer than I expected. We didn't have time to frost the cupcakes and so I decided that we would just have the girls decorate their own cupcakes. They enjoyed doing that and some of them dumped way too many sprinkles, ha ha. 

Alice putting sprinkles on top before putting them in the oven to bake.

Stuffing the pinata.

Some of the girls had already arrived and started eating fruit before I thought to take a picture. I was trying to have healthy snacks available. Fruit, carrots w/ranch, celery w/peanut butter and baked chips.

We did things out of order than usual by singing the birthday song and having dessert right after eating lunch. Then we opened presents. Then we played a game and did the pinata. One game was Pass the Parcel, which the girls saw on the TV show "Bluey". I bought a big prize and had Garrett wrap it multiple times. The girls sat in a circle and passed the gift around while I played music. As soon as the music stopped, the person holding the gift gets to unwrap a layer. They keep going until someone gets to the prize. I didn't mean for it to happen this way, but the delay on my phone when pausing caused it to land on Alice, the birthday girl. I wanted someone else to win it since she already got presents. Oops! Later Alice gave the prize, which was a large colorful squishy stress ball, to Charlotte after the friends all left. That was so nice of her. 

It had been raining earlier in the day but thankfully it dried up enough for doing the pinata. I wasn't sure how we were going to do it if it was inside.

One of the friends had to leave early to go to another party.

Alice and her gifts. A nice coat to wear on Sundays, Cheetos snack, Bluey plushies, playdoh set, makeup, new shoes, glow stick wand (from Charlotte), Rapunzel Lego set, Bluey puzzle, a finger monkey toy, a potion bottle with a doll inside, and the big squishy ball prize. There were a few things in that brown bag also.

I had Charlotte take a picture of me and Alice later since Curtis was busy working in the garage.

This was a fun doll that you had to put ingredients in for a potion to reveal the doll inside. She gets to keep the bottle also.

The girls put together the Bluey puzzle. It was 48 pieces.

I had decided that since we didn't have grandparents here to celebrate that we would go ahead and just have one party. It was a little crazy though. The boys weren't even around when Alice opened her gifts. I think I will go back to splitting up the friends and the family parties. Alice had a great day and loved her party though. 

Band Concert and Temple Trip

I had bought a Christmas puzzle for either the kids or all of us to do sometime this season. None of the kids wanted to help us so Curtis and I did it together. It was only 300 pieces so it just took a couple of hours. I like puzzles like my dad but I prefer to work on them with someone. It reminds me of when we did puzzles at the cabin or at my grandma's house as a kid. Curtis doesn't normally like doing puzzles but he was a good sport and helped me with this one.

I just recently started putting my hair up in the claw again. I haven't done it that way in a long time. Alice liked it so she asked me to do her hair like that. Charlotte wanted hers too but I only had one.

She wore her hair like this to church.

Wednesday morning, Charlotte woke up with pink eye and her eye glued shut. Fortunately, we already had the prescription eye drops we needed from when Alice had it a year ago. After 24 hours of medication, she is not contagious anymore and was able to go to school the next day. It was "fun" trying to wipe down all of the doorknobs and handles and things she might have touched. I also washed her bedding and clothes. After one or two doses of eye drops, her eyes looked much better.

Jack had his holiday band concert on Thursday, the 14th. It was a combined concert with the band, choir and orchestra. The girls came with us to this concert, but Jack stayed home.

Jack and his friend, Eli, before the concert. They borrowed Curtis's Christmas ties and Santa hats.

I'm glad I got this shot before they started because I couldn't see him during the performance. This was with the concert band and he played the French horn.

I love that the director wore a Christmas suit.

The jazz band played up behind us. They needed to save space on the stage.

Everyone together at the end.

Milo is having fun with his toys and it's so cute to see him grab his toys first thing in the morning after he has gone potty. It's usually his chew bone that he grabs and takes it upstairs. He's also gotten good at grabbing this ball toy. This toy makes noise as it rolls. It's better for outdoors. It's hard smooth plastic but there are a couple of holes they put on it for the dog to grip it. 

Last Saturday I finally scheduled us to go do baptisms again. It was a great way to start the day. The boys said it made them feel good being in the temple. We were able to do 10 male and 10 female names, along with two males that were confirmation only. It was foggy that morning but beautiful.

Got a picture in the car on the way to the temple.

Then I got a shot of the temple afterwards.