Christmas 2011

Another Christmas has come and gone. It was a great one where we ate a lot, played a lot, visited a lot, spent too much money and didn't take hardly any pictures. Without a bunch of good pictures it is hard for me to know where to start - so I'll start with the only pictures I have which are from the Christmas Eve Nativity Pageant. The pictures aren't of the best quality since they were taken by Andrew ( so he is not in any of them) with Sam's i-phone. I love the group shot because it shows Karen and Eve is their cute animal costumes. Thank goodness for Karen being an animal, so Eve could have fun being an animal and not sad about not being an angel. Elise (7) was Mary and she tried to get her brother Chase (3) to be Joseph but that didn't fly, so her dad (Sam) was Joseph, with Chase trying to be there with his Dad the whole time.
Here are Audrey and Jackie being the Angels of the Lord. We have a Christmas cd that quotes the angel of the Lord bible verses in one of the songs, so Jackie has that part memorized. Because of this she always wants to have that part, and so far has not had to fight for it. Eventually someone else will want to have it, but until then Jackie will continue to bring good tiding of great joy to us each Christmas Eve. Audrey was pretty adorable as well.
This was the first year that Alice has been a performer in the pageant. She has always been to shy and instead would be back stage working the lights (holding a big flashlight). This year she decided to be a wise man with her beloved aunt Anne and wasn't even embarrassed of me joining her. She did a great job and looked "kingly" in her outfit. Anne's outfit was exceptionally original this year - you can't really see in this picture but she basically has a birds nest on her head.

Christmas Eve we always have an ethnic dinner. This year we chose Greek food and it was SOOOO GOOD. It was better than Christmas dinner in my opinion. We had calimari, Garlic shrimp, souvlaki chicken, lemon garlic lamb chops, pita bread and tzatziki a salad and baklava for dessert. It was divine.

After dinner and the pageant we read an abridged version of the Best Christmas Pageant Ever, then we put out our stockings and put cookies and milk out for Santa and some food for the Reindeer and then the kids went to bed. Alice, who this year as been initiated into the world of adults by not believing in Santa, kept asking me things in a sly and secretive way like " are you going to put the stuff in our stockings before you go to bed or just as you wake up". Alice was careful to allow the rest of the kids to believe is Santa and really enjoyed being in the adult club. Not believing in the man in red did not seem to squelch Alice's Christmas excitement - I think she maybe slept a total of 2 hours tops.

After the kids went to bed we Anne, Andrew and I watched It's a wonderful like and cried in all the usual places. Anne would get texts from Greg and we knew that he and Nicole were watching it too. Family Traditions bring us together even when we are apart. "sniff sniff".

So that was Christmas Eve! I didn't get much sleep - due to my own excitement and Alice's late night antics. At 4:30 I decided to stop trying to get her to sleep and just take her upstairs and give her a book to read. I read the Hudson Family Book Club pick ( the Sisters Brothers) and she read Time at the Top and asked me what time it was every 15 minutes until 6:00 when we finally got to wake everyone up. Anne nearly had a heart attack when we woke her up.

So that was Christmas Eve - I'll write about Christmas day another time. Still can't believe the Christmas Break is over.