Here are some of our favorite things from this Christmas season...
Jackson's last day of school before the break was pajama day, so he got to wear his "Christmas PJs" to school that day... (please excuse the tree needles on the floor)...
The older boys just loved going for a drive to look at Christmas lights after baths in their PJs and slippers this year. They went at least 10 times. Phil usually took them by himself because Reid was usually asleep by then, but we all went together a few times...
I was holding my hands up in the air to get them to look up at me and they both did the same... :)
Probably our most favorite thing this year was reading all of our Christmas books. I got this idea from a blogger last year and it has just been the most wonderful thing. At the beginning of December I wrap up a bunch of Christmas books and put them under the tree. We use them as a kind of advent calendar thing and the boys unwrap one book each night until Christmas. Actually, though, we usually ended up opening two almost every night because I have so many and we skipped several nights due to getting home late, etc. I really had no idea that they would love all of the books so much, but we read them all. the. time. throughout the month. Of course they loved to have me or Phil read the books to them, but I was surprised at how much they loved to look at them by themselves.
This isn't a Christmas book, but I looked in the playroom the other day and J was "reading" this book to E. I'm so, so happy that they are enjoying books so much.
Another favorite thing was making and decorating gingerbread cookies. I really tried hard not to worry about a mess and let the boys help me with every step. That book that E is reading in the above picture is one of their favorites and is about a gingerbread boy, so they were excited to make their own cookies.
I even stripped their shirts off and let them go nuts with decorating. They LOVED it. It is so funny how different they are in some ways. Jackson had not one drop of frosting on him afterwards and E was covered. :)
One of the Christmas books we have is "The Twelve Days of Christmas" and on the very last page it has sheet music that goes with the song. After reading it to the boys one time I got a wild hair to pull out my flute (that I haven't touched in about 14 years) and try to play the song. I could not believe how my fingers just went in all of the right places even though I haven't attempted to read music in such a long time. I thought for sure that those brain cells were long gone, but I guess reading music is like riding a bike. Jackson really loved seeing me play that flute. He tried to do it himself, but it was hard for him to get a sound out. Later, when Phil got home he pulled out his trumpet (since we don't own a tuba) and let Jackson try to play it. J was so excited because he was actually able to play a bunch of different notes!
J seemed really excited and interested in the instruments. I hope he's a future musician like his parents! Phil and I had a bunch of laughs that night because I was trying to play songs from our pregame show at FSU on my flute. I couldn't even remember how to play our fight song or the war chant! Phil helped me by playing the songs off of our computer and when I heard them out loud most of the notes came back to me... but I was still missing a bunch and we were cracking up. I guess we're still band dorks at heart! :) I could tell I'm really getting old, though, because not only could I not remember how to play the songs, but I also couldn't even remember the names of most of the songs from FSU pregame! Or maybe I'm just trying not to remember how old I really am... college was like 15 years ago! Ugh.
Speaking of getting old... my 35th (aka halfway to 40... double ugh) birthday was last week and I got a present that I've been wanting for five long years...
That's an iPhone for any of you who may not be familiar. I have wanted one since they came out in 2007 and my sister got the very first version. We (Phil) never wanted to switch from Verizon to AT&T, so we had to wait until Verizon got the iPhone. Then when that happened last year I still had to wait because... and I quote, "Your Droid phone works fine and does everything an iPhone does." :) Which, to be honest, he's right about. But sweet hubs used the upgrade available for his phone and bought me this shiny new iPhone for my birthday anyway. Thank you, Phil!
He also bought some Oreo cupcakes for us all to share. And by us all I mean me and Emmett. :)
Jackson just licked some of the icing off the top of his. ;)
Emmett fully enjoys all of his sweets, just like Mommy.
I'll post some pics from Christmas day soon! Hope you had a wonderful holiday!
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