Today was a great day! I had a bit of an attitude for about an hour in the middle, but I go over it. Keturah woke up first at 2:30am and opened up her stocking. Then she went back to bed. Abishai woke up around 7:30 and then the real day began. I think we finally roused Benaiah up around 8:30 or 9. Abishai is so much into all of the "magic" this year. Yes, Santa, the countdown, the lights, the presents, etc. And it does make it more fun to have a little one around. However, we've spent a little bit of time talking about Jesus' birthday, too. We wrapped up our Little People nativity set Jesus figurine to open as the "first gift." We prayed, too. Then Benaiah played Santa. Everybody oohed and aahed over gifts, making it as exciting for Abishai as possible. No one argued! I had picked out the perfect gifts, too, so everybody was happy. I think it took us under an hour to get through our 3-5 gifts each. That left plenty of time to organize, cleanup, and even play with some things before heading over to Gary and Leah's for lunch and part 2.
I thought I had talked about Skyping Aaron and Shauna while we opened gifts, but that was miscommunicated somehow. So instead, they watched us via FaceTime open the gifts they left behind for us and then went on with their day while we opened the gifts Gary and Leah gave us. Again, no major meltdowns, everybody got what they wanted and then some, and we enjoyed our ham dinner together. I wish I had pushed myself to write down some details because it's now two days later and I'm drawing a blank. I'm sure I'll add more once I caption the photos. But I think it's enough to note that it was a simple, but fulfilling day, watching the kids' excitement and being together. We didn't have any extra guests or extended family. We didn't have to get fully dressed even. We drive to the parents' house because we knew we would need a place to put the gifts to bring them home. It was basically the peace and quiet we all needed after 5 weeks with extended family and of course a full day on Sunday. And then, we were all done being social. We all needed our own space to tinker with our things. And that's what the rest of the week consisted of. Quiet, no obligations, no outside commitments, a few indoor projects that were planned, no school, just relaxed and laid back. Exactly opposite of how I feel our typical vacations go. At least at home we all have our separate comfort places so we can be ourselves and don't exhausted ourselves socially. We don't have to coordinate plans for dinner or visits to tourist attractions. It's like a week long Saturday because Jared is home all week! It's nice having a second parent around instead of just relying on kids to take care of Abishai so I can work on Keturah's room. Jared also has to finish grading papers for his fall juniors level Bible class, and Benaiah's handwriting is nearly the hardest one to read! Oi!
And even Benaiah has a nice quiet week! He's off on his overnight "playdate" with Ethan has I type this. I told him not to come home too soon. He NEEDS this more than he knows after his explosion on Christmas Eve. He NEEDS to be with (mostly) mature kids that think like he does and have been brought up like he has. He NEEDS to eat junk food and play video games all night. He NEEDS to have balance and we are here to help him learn it and keep our minds open to him being gone. He even took a NAP before he went on his "playdate" just like he would have done after a playdate as a toddler, lol. Really, these teens are just toddlers in grownup bodies. It's such a true comparison sometimes! And he bought $40 worth of junk food for Ethan and he, including oreos, goldfish, chips, monster drinks, iced teas, and the like. Crazy boy, go have the time of your life! THIS is what high school is all about, hanging out with your REAL friends. He did go to school on Wednesday morning first to help sand chairs. The juniors have to sand these chairs for a facility so they can use the facility for their prom in the spring. And guess how many showed up? 2 boys and 2 parents. 2 boys out of 7. They had to split the genders up because of some social issues. Of course! I knew this would happen. He asked permission to help out next week when it's the girls' turn, but after that, he's back to his paid job and won't have the opportunity to volunteer again. And if they don't get those chairs done, too bad. The 20% cannot do 80% of the work all the time. They burnout! So say no, and let other step up to the plate. That's what I've done and it usually works out. I didn't even have to help out in the nursery during Christmas services. We'll see what the stats are next week, but 2 kids out of 7 or even 10 (how big their class size is) is pitiful. And it's a family culture that produces this. That's why we love the different opportunities to serve in multiple things at our church. We certainly don't volunteer for everything, but we put in our part (and more than our part sometimes, because it's hard wired in both of us to serve because we've done it since we were young because our parents SET that example way back when). But now the schools have to require volunteering hours because it's not happening voluntarily. Again, pitiful, selfish, and frustrating to those who do serve. Moving on....
The other kids don't have playdates this week and I'm kind of burnt out on Christmas activities, so I dropped the ball on all those things. And that's ok. We all love to sit at home and putter and it's so much more peaceful and physically hurts me less. And doesn't that same something about the family culture and home we've tried to put together, albeit imperfectly? Yes, it does, and I do put some hope, some thankfulness, and a little pat on my back (and Jared's) that why yes, we have done a decent enough job that our kids want to be home with us. They aren't trying to escape because there's drugs, alcohol, abuse, divorce, constant fighting, etc. in our house. We have more than enough to play with, read, and do. They DO play with one another, and fight, and resolve their fights, and play again. And on the days where I just can't stand them anymore, I will need to remember these moments where, when there isn't the outside stress of a schedule, or the inside stress of keeping a school schedule, we are a tight knit family. And we are doing ok raising our kids and whatever we don't do, God has already filled in the gaps, with their education, with their character, with their friendships, and with their relationships with God. We are blessed beyond measure, that's for sure.
Christmas at Home Playlist
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| Christmas Eve wrapping party! It was fun having a wrapping station out in the garage! We put one of the portable heaters out there so we weren't as cold, but the garage is typically maybe 10 degrees at the most cooler than the house. I had to carefully hide all the gifts under the table and then arrange just the ones that that child could see (gifts for their siblings that Mom and Dad bought, not that Santa will bring, at least for Keturah and Abishai). I still had to help a ton, but just having the company next to me was helpful. We've been doing this for years because I'm a big fan of wrapping and I like to delegate when I can. Keturah decided on which paper was for who, and for the most part, we used that paper for that particular person. The kids seems to like knowing that this pattern is theirs. And it didn't seem to phase Keturah that I was going to wrap her presents from Santa later when they arrived. Kids can be so clueless sometimes! And in this case, it works out well! |
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| My little left handed guy wanted to cut the paper! And he did a great job! He at first thought he was going out to the garage to open presents, but soon he understood that we were wrapping them. He lasted through wrapping two gifts. Yeah! We typically have 3 gifts per person, one from Santa and two from Mom and Dad. Because some of my gifts were combined with theirs, I also wrapped some things I had bought that weren't exactly Christmas gifts but could be (see below). That cuts down on our wrapping time. We always wrap on Christmas Eve because my parents did, although they did all of it after we went to bed. We did that for a long time but then started doing this daytime method while in Charlottetown. I still went to bed a bit late, but not as stressed. The only thing I would have added to this method would be to pull over those foam mats in front of the washing machine. When we were done, about 3-4 hrs later, my knees ached from standing on the concrete. I was not happy. I should have known better! Oh well, there's always next year! |
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| Santa's cookies, eggnog, and carrots for the reindeer are ready! Abishai didn't understand what we were doing, plus he was tired. He really liked this picture Keturah colored in from church on Sunday that she wanted to give Santa. So, Santa left it for him! |
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| Oh and we included the peppermint candy we made. Justin ate the cookies, drank the eggnog, put back the carrots, and threw away the candy. |
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| Tada! Christmas! |
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| Note from Santa with the best present of all, Jesus! |
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| Justin tidied up the room so sweetly! He put the stuffed animals in the corners of the couch and folded the blanket and draped it over the couch. He can be very neat and organized when he wants to be. |
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| Stockings all hung up! I had to wait until Benaiah was in bed, lol. |
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| Keturah woke up at 2:30am, but went back to bed after opening her stocking. Abishai came racing in the room with his stocking at 7:30. So I quickly got up with my DSLR camera, which I had put beside my bed, to capture the stocking opening, which I usually miss. Stockings are so simple yet they make them all feel so special! They get their own stash of candy, an orange, and a toy or two. Abishai got little Paw Patrol figurines and an ice cream truck and a hot dog/hamburger truck. |
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| Keturah got art supplies like glitter glue and green apple smelling pencils, along with more decks for our Historical Conquest game. |
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| Justin received a travel game called Left Center Right and some Historical Conquest cards. And I'm glad that they wanted and Aldi's had the plastic candy cane tube of candy. We used to get those in our stockings! |
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| Read carefully! The kids thought these were real Ramen noddles! It's a gag gift for Jared! |
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| "Boil some water, and then pour it out!" the directions say. Then write on your sticky notes! |
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| Showing Daddy all their surprises! |
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| We finally got Benaiah to get up around 8:30. He got some putty that looks like glass. |
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| Abishai was very proud of his loot and put it all back into his stocking to carry it to the fireside room. We then made them eat some breakfast, while Jared started a fire. Some of us of course had the Howell cranberry bread. |
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| Waiting on Daddy and Mommy to be ready. Yes, we're mean parents making them wait! In the Howell household, we could open one gift, then eat our soft baked gingerbread men with raisins eyes my grandmother made, and then we could open the rest. And yes, I made them do their chores while they waited for us, too. |
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| Abishai and Daddy opening the first present...baby Jesus. We don't read the birth of Jesus like Gary and Leah do, but we talk about Him. It's the Jesus from the Little People nativity set we got when Benaiah was 2 years old. I've wrapped baby Jesus up every year since. |
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| Benaiah played Santa and handed out gifts. Abishai was very excited to get started. Benaiah pulled everything out from under the tree and did a pre sort because the bigger (and somewhat better) gifts were the bigger ones in front and we wanted to open those up last. |
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| Aww, Abishai didn't understand why he had to wait to open up his big gift. |
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| For the crafty lady, a sewing kit and some craft tape. |
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| Benaiah asked for blue light filtering sunglasses for gaming and a special mouse cord keeper so it's easier to move his mouse around. |
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| Just what she wanted! A signboard with lots of different colors of letters! |
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| A Paw Patrol punching bag! |
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| What is it?! |
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| Just what he wanted, merchandise from his favorite gaming YouTuber, Unspeakable! |
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| His favorite color. |
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| I bought them a size big so he could grow into them and wear them for years. They are adult mediums, which is what Aaron wears, so I figure he could still wear them when he stops growing. They weren't exactly cheap, although I got them on a Black Friday sale. This hoodie was basically backordered, so they took it out of my order and refunded my money for it. Then I could reorder it and they would reimburse me the sale price, which they did. Retail of this hoodie is $45. Ouch! |
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| This is the gift that I was talking about that I didn't have to wrap. I bought four books where you can write down the stories of your childhood in a journal format with quesitons to prompt you. I got one for Jared that says Dad, one for me that says Mom, and then Grandpa and Grandma ones for my parents, so I can fill out the details of what I remember. Leah already has a book like this that she started to fill in. She said her mom has one, but when her mom gave it back to her, there were a lot of blanks or just a few words and it left her feeling empty. Well, I just don't want my kids to have to worry about this on when I'm on my deathbed, so I'm doing it now for them. This paper was Jared's paper, but I used it on the Grandpa book because my Dad liked plaid. |
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| Someone's tired. Who opens presents lying down? He also received adult piano books because he's been asking me different things about chords and theory. And, we paid for his ticket to see 21 Pilots this coming June. Yes, we bought them actually in October, so nearly 8 months in advance. Crazy! Justin and I got tickets to see TobyMac, Jordan Feliz, and Jeremy Camp
in February. Jared and I got tickets to John Crist and friends in
April. I almost didn't get those tickets because on the day of the pre
sale I hesitated, and then the next day those tickets were gone! But a
day after that, they added a matinee show here in Indy, so that is the
time we are going. Craziness! I couldn't find a musical I liked for
Keturah and I to go to, so I'll have to plan that separately. And he wasn't quite into yet, plus I didn't know about it, but Paw Patrol is going to be here this next weekend on stage. I've never taken the kids to Disney on Ice or any of these stage shows based on TV characters because I don't think they get $25 worth of memories out of it, but, you never know. The 4th kid is the spoiled one, lol. |
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| Daddy got new white t-shirts that Mommy is going to label so Benaiah doesn't wear them and get them all greased up! And Daddy got socks because Daddy is hard to buy for. All the kids also got a piece fo paper reminding them of all the toys we bought last June when Toys R Us went out of business. I put a reminder on my phone to print pictures of those toys and had told them in June that Christmas was going to be less because of it. Well, Christmas wasn't less, but it was a good reminder that we get gifts all the time. |
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| We got Socks some yummy meatloaf treats! He also got a peanut butter dog cookie in his stocking, and he took forever to eat it, too. |
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| Hm,...what's this? Oh yeah! It's the RC trucks that Daddy hid in the bathroom closest from our Toys R Us purchases. It took few months, but Abishai had finally forgotten about them. They were "extra" in his present stash, so they made presents 4 and 5 for him. |
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| Big heavy box. What could it be? Horse books to help complete her (and my) favorite series, the Thoroughbred series! She actually got TWO boxes of books, and there were also Saddle Club books in there, too. There's some gaps in the sequencing that we can fill in later. But I think I paid $1 per book or so. Yeah! |
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| Here come Abishai's big present from Santa, Stefanie, and Auggie! It almost didn't come! We got it midday ON CHRISTMAS EVE. It was a good thing that I had some back up gifts that I will now save for his birthday. That was a close one! |
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| Now what could it be? It's the Paw Patrol control tower! |
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| And some of the pups with their vehicles! And some Paw Patrol buckets! The control tower even has a detachable sound button that says all kinds of things. There's the elevator for the pups and for Ryder, the human! Plus it came with the felt play mat and some Paw Patrol underwear (which he prefers and loves to wear now, lol!) |
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| And the last big gift was a water fizzing machine that Benaiah bought for the whole family! He first thought about Dad (and himself) which was so thoughtful and generous. I was there when he purchased it, too, and I encouraged him to just buy it because I had been eyeing it for years and years. Benaiah hid it in the garage by putting it among other boxes and said you could see it if you looked hard enough, but no one found it! He bought the machine, extra bottles, and 4 different flavors. And it's not electric! It does take up a little bit of counter space, but we made room for it. Way to go Benaiah! |
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| How teenagers leave things after late night wrapping parties. |
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| Sitting by the fire. |
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| Since the older kids didn't get toys, they have been very interested in playing Abishai new toys! |
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| The start of our Paw Patrol collection! |
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| Note from Santa! |
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| Socks' meatloaf morsels, which he loves! |
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| Again, I told Jared not to buy me anything because I had already spent enough on things like these clearance items on the Third Day website. I paid $16 for two tshirts, two wristbands, and a set of drumsticks. Plus, the receipt is for my $30 steak dinner I had with the ladies at Mom's Night Out. Yup, I spent enough. I also am treating myself to a 1 hr full body massage next week because I got a 40% off coupon from the lady who did my chair massage last month. And I'm very ok with this. Sure it's nice when Jared thinks of me and picks something out, but I didn't want him to worry about it, and I really wanted these things that he had no clue about, so it works out. Plus, we are going to our first "concert" together in April, comedian John Crist! In 20 years of being together, we've never gone to any event like this together. So I'm excited. And I get to go with Justin to TobyMac! And we'll be going to WinterJam, and I'm hoping Jared will go to that, too. I was excited to do all planning and shopping (any excuse to spend money since I'm the money spender in the family) because I figured things out pretty quickly. Justin wasn't as excited about the concert tickets, but believe me, we are going to have a blast and it's local! No overnight this time! |
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| Here are those memory books! |
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| Abishai loves his $7 punching bag from Aldi's! I bought it on a whim. It needs some sand on the bottom, but he's been basically wrestling it to the ground and getting on top of it. Great toy for those boy hormones and getting little boy energy out! |
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| Tada! Fizzy water machine all set up! The energy drink is for Benaiah and he says it tastes like Red Bulls. I want to try it at some point. Then he bought lemon/lime aka Sprite for the other kids and Raspberry and Lime for Dad. There's a ton of flavors, Soadastream brand or others, and Kroger sells them. The flavors cost anywhere from $4 to $6 but makes 12 liters or so? The co2 canister is something like $30, and I don't know how long it lasts. But if you take the empty one back to the store, you get a discount on the new one. This model costs about $80. You don't get to choose your fizziness though. We'll see how long the novelty runs. So far though (a week later) Jared has used it a couple of times a day every day, just with plain water. The drops don't have any sugar in them. And of course you can fizz up your water and then add any essential oils you like as well, which is even healthier! The other kids are interested in it, but then they don't want to finish the bottles we make for them, especially Abishai. So it will be a rare treat for them to have it. I want to get a diet coke or cherry coke one. I LOVE fountain drinks over 2L or canned pop, so this should be interesting! They also have a version of Dr. Pepper. Thanks, Benaiah, for working hard and being so generous! I know it makes you feel great to contribute to the family like this and pay for your things. Way to go! |
Now, over the river and through the woods, to grandparents us we go for part 2 of our Christmas Day....
