1.6.15- Christmas Set-Up

Obviously we had a busy month of Christmas- don't we all, when we have children? Or maybe I was just eating lots of cookies??? It's hard to come off that sugar high. Actually we were very busy with church, school, the end of basketball for Anna, life, and the normal things that have to keep happening to keep living. It was a great month in terms of accomplishment and one that has put me in slow motion mode ever since.

After much doing good elsewhere I realized that the days were passing us by and we needed to get our house decorated and our tree up on December 15th. This also happened to be a special day for Greg and I. He got me flowers. A first for many years. He did in the beginning of our marriage but when we became focused on saving for a house all extra things were done away with. I have regretted that focus on many levels as I do like flowers, but I like a savings account too. I was very surprised when the florist was leaving his shop that day as I got there to pick the kids up from the bus. The flowers were the extent of our celebrating that day as we were trying to get festive here at home.

One of our Christmas tradition is to make a paper chain to hang on our tree. It's hardy, cheap and a good activity in sharing and patience and it's okay if it gets handled. The last few years we've invested in staples and stapler as it is so much quicker than waiting for glue to dry. Although we never have enough staplers it is still an exciting task. Livy was big enough to help some this year.

Another of our traditions is to make amazing paper snowflakes with our very talented Aunt Brenda. We love when she comes home. She was super patient instructing 7 kids how to fold, cut and carefully open these masterpieces. Don't be fooled by Reed he folded (I think) and then pointed to where he wanted Aunt Brenda to cut. I took the little girls to bathe and read a story to try to  calm the situation a bit. Aunt Brenda's annual trip home is an exciting beginning to the holiday season each year.