Let's start with the advent calendar. The last time I spoke with you, I was in a race to make an advent calendar (geez! that was in Nov.). I did make that calendar and manage to fill it with goodies and notes with fun activities. I'm glad I pulled my act together and made it because this brought us together every evening after dinner for some holiday fun, something the boys really enjoyed.
I always look forward to getting a Christmas tree but this year's search for a tree was a bit stressful (yes I'll share the good and the bad with you). We bickered over which tree to get, finally settled on a tree when suddenly it began to rain on us. Dad was a trooper and strapped it on our van but the ride home was stressful to say the least. Our tree began to slip and slide as we made our way home on the freeway, I held my breath hoping we wouldn't lose it.
Despite the ill beginning to our Christmas tree adventure, we sure had fun decorating it.
I love pulling out all the Christmas treasures and this year, the boys made some really sweet ornaments that I'm sure to treasure for years to come.
This year I was in charge of the craft activity for Aidan's classroom holiday party. I wanted to include a lesson on "recycle, repurpose, reuse," so I chose this project. The class had fun with it and I really loved the end product but the prep work for a class of 19 students was a bit gruelling...note to self for next year, remember during December every second counts, choose much simpler project.
It's been our tradition to buy the boys an new ornament every year, you know so when they finally set up their own tree they'll be able to start with 18 ornaments of their own, that is assuming they move out at 18. Oh, and really mom, 18 year old boys just love setting up their own tree...so maybe not 18 but sometime later in life they'll have some of their own keepsakes (or their wives at will at least). This year in sticking with the "Repurpose" theme, we bought them these great upcycle ornaments made from old bike parts. I just love them!
We also decorated our yearly gingerbread house. This year I bought a kit that had the structure already assembled and all you had to do was decorate it. This was so much easier and we got to go directly to the fun part, I'll be doing this every year from now on.
We enjoyed some fun Christmas decorations including a new lamp that I filled with vintage baubles, some collage work I made for our bathroom wall and our Christmas card holder that was topped with a fun wreath Aidan made.
We enjoyed hosting several holiday dinners with friends, including Christmas Eve, having hot pot with good friends. Hot pot crab, mmm one of my favorite things of the season.
Christmas morning brought lots of surprises for the kids, including this letter from Santa. Yes, with all the fun we had Christmas Eve, we forgot to leave Santa cookies and milk. Santa was still good enough to leave lots of special treats. After a morning of opening presents we went to Auntie Sandra's house and had a fun filled day with family.
Oh and let's not forget, during all this holiday fun we also celebrated lots of birthdays including Daddy's big "40"
December was busy but good to all of us. We sure enjoyed our Christmas this 2010. Hope you all enjoyed your holidays as well.
