The End of Vacation...

(Little Gi past midnight on New Years Eve)

A little known fact is that while many families are sad on the last day of school vacation, when Mom's have to go back also, the day is positively tragic! Another well-kept secret is that spouses of educators are secretly jealous of our snow days and many holidays and vacations and they relish with pleasure the last day of vacation.. specifically summer vacation... but nevertheless....this Sunday our wonderful Christmas break ended and we had to adjust from lazy mornings to rude awakenings and rushing out the door by 7:30 am!! Our last day was spent trying to squeeze in every last activity possible. The American Girl dolls performed a final show complete with the stage and microphone and guitar Santa brought.... there were many acts and we even called Daddy in after the intermission to watch the performance (he very nicely fell asleep through it instead of protesting) and that was our vacation. We had a wonderful New Years Eve with our cousins- it seems to be a new tradition in our family at midnight to watch the daredevil motorcycle dude risk death every year on a new stunt.. does anyone else do that? We enjoy being home surrounded by family and friends each year to ring in the new year. This morning we dragged ourselves back to our regular routine. The girls were glad to see their friends and I suppose we will adjust back.. but it was so nice to to have those lazy vacation days!!

Christmas!!!

Well needless to say...we had a very merry this year once again. Thank god everyone stayed healthy and we partied on Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, The Nutcracker on the 26th, Saturday at Nana's and Sunday with our friends from out of town... and now on to New Years Eve!!! The girls had a great run with Santa- even though even Santa's visit cannot stop them from fighting with each other! Santa brought many dolls and accessories. Our cousins all got the Wii so that seems to be looming in the future...another year please! We are now surrounded by our gifts and our school vacation is going way too fast....I get such a kick out of the phrase "I have nothing to do" when the tree is still up with presents underneath!!! All in all no one can complain- we had a beautiful white Christmas- that went by too fast!

SNOW!

Six days before Christmas and we were visited by the first snow storm of the year! The girls got a day off of school from it so it was extra special. This year they were excited to go sledding and Al let them go down our hilly driveway on their belly face first and they had such a blast! Gi eats fistfuls of snow like they are snow cones no matter how many times I ask her to stop. They both dive knee deep into snow piles when they are not wearing snow pants and usually when we are on our way to some event that I do not want them wet for...they are really enjoying the winter and it is not even Christmas!! We walked down the road to a neighbor's Christmas party and it was one of the few times the four of us went for a winter hike. It was a lot of fun. What I do not understand is no matter how many waterproof layers I put on them (and I put a ton on Gi) they always are sopping wet when they come in. How does that happen? And they ALWAYS need hot chocolate the second they get inside. Which usually leads to putting on the movie The Polar Express. This year the season started early!

Angels- part 2

Along the subject of angels.. the girls are participating in a Nativity Play this year. We are involved in a different religious education program with the church this year, and the girls seem to be getting a lot more out of it. Not that they behave any better in church.... they are both angels in the play, and Daniella has a line where she appears to the Shepherds to announce the birth of Christ. It is so funny to hear Gi explain the Nativity Story from her perspective. Kids are priceless in that respect. She gets the main idea, but it is funny to hear about why they are in the "barn". It should be a very cute play- filled with many mistakes that make it even cuter...Merry Christmas!

The Angel on the tree

Al is so good at creating traditions with the girls. Much better than I am. I think he has a fresher perspective because I am with them 24/7 through the daily routines of the day. He is also way more patient than I am! Anyway, every year when he puts up the Christmas tree since D was a baby, he has held her up at the top for a picture as the angel on the tree. It was SUCH a cute picture. Well as you can imagine, over the years, she soon got too big for that. But little sister G came along, so there was another tiny angel to hold up. The last few years he has laughed in his attempts to get them up there...even last year he could pick up G with one hand... but this year there it was not happening. He was sad, but managed to figure something out as you see in the picture. Of course the tree was not completely up at that point. We have a large artificial tree that we bought after our first year in the house nine years ago when we went to take the live tree down and realized watering it had warped our wood floor.... but that is a whole other story! Ho-Ho-Ho!

Osmond Mania

I have to confess a very embarrassing thing here... I am a huge Donny & Marie fan at my ripe old age. As if that is not embarrassing enough.. my 8 year old daughter is becoming a big fan of theirs as well! I do not actually know how all this has transpired... i think she senses how much I like them, and she emulates that.... it is so strange to see! I actually saw a reunion special of the Osmonds recently, and I told the girls how much I liked them growing up, and about my friends and I acting out all the songs... then I showed them the tape of these 50 year old adults and my daughter was not impressed. Not stopping there, I started showing them the clips from their 70's TV show, and THEN they were hooked. What touches me is that I remember clearly being 8 years old myself and thinking Marie was so beautiful and Donny was just (and still remains) gorgeous...she mentioned Donny and Marie in her 3rd grade class at show and tell- what a riot!!- her friends thought she was talking about her cousins- no one knew who she was talking about- except of course- her 30 something year old teacher- who also loved them! My husband recently returned from a trip to Las Vegas where they are playing. I am trying to talk him into taking me to see them- except my 8 year old is determined to go to the show as well to see Marie!!! I think truthfully the Osmonds for me bring back happy memories of childhood friends and of being young.. a very happy and innocent time in life!

Santa

Today we went to our church fair and got a picture of the girls with Santa. I do not usually go out of my way to get pictures on Santa's knee only because selfishly I cannot bear the thought of going to a crowded mall and waiting on a huge line. The last time the girls sat on Santa's knee was....hmmmm... I don't know! The other thing is that Gi has always been a bit squeamish about costumes and characters- she screamed in terror through Disney On Ice and the Nutcracker just a few short years back- so I go easy with things of this nature. Nevertheless, it was a quiet little corner of the fair and no one was there, so I thought it was perfect! As we were approaching Mr. Claus, my 6 year old stopped me from walking and confessed, "Mommy, I am a little bit nervous". She was too old to cry in fear, but still too young to be cool about it- like her 8 year old sister. So I pulled my Mommy wisdom out and said that it was Santa's helper- in a costume- not the real one- and big sister will be there with her... and before any future protests could emerge they were shuttled onto his knee with a smile for the camera. When Santa asked Gi what she wanted for Christmas, she responded, "Lots of things..." and left it at that. I guess she did not want to engage in too much conversation!! All in all it was a very cute experience. The picture shows two perfect little angel faces sitting on the knee of a jolly old elf... three visions of sugar plums dancing in my head!