The Christmas Post

Last year at this time, I was pregnant with the boys. I was dealing with morning sickness that lasted all day and trouble sleeping. We didn't even make it to Poppa and Granny J's house for dinner because I was too ill. My, how things have changed!

On Monday the boys and I ventured out to get Jim a gift for Christmas. I had been waiting for blue-ray players to go back on sale, and now was the time. Traffic was terrible. It took us close to an hour to get to the store, which is twice as long as normal. Once we got there, it was wall-to-wall people. I had the boys in their stroller and they were doing ok, but not great. I ask one of the store employees if they have any of the specific player that Jim wanted. He looks around and says they're all out. So here I am, comparing boxes and trying to learn about these things on the fly because we ARE NOT coming out into this chaos again.

Alex starts flipping out. A lady stops by and asks if she could help me somehow, like by holding one. I assure her I have everything under control. I totally don't, but I'm not comfortable with strangers holding them and it hurts my pride a little that they're so obviously upset. I finally pick out a new player and head towards the DVD section. On the way we come across a whole stack of the player Jim wanted. UGH! So we take back the one we have and grab the blue-ray player we came for.

And then I notice the line to checkout. Let's just say that it was so long that a picture of it made the newspaper. No kidding. So I'm bouncing, entertaining, and trying my best to keep the boys from having a total melt down. I get Zach out of the stroller since he's on the verge of crying. Alex sees this and gets mad. I look around in desperation and grab the closest thing I can think of to make him happy - a bag of peanut M&M's.  Yes, it was a very ghetto moment, but it sort of worked.  I would shake the candy and he would grab it from me and chew on the bag.  We got comments from people nearby, so the lack of quality parenting was pretty obvious I guess.

To get everything done that I wanted for the holidays, I had a pretty full schedule for every evening this week.  The boys had other plans, Alex especially.  It has become extremely difficult to put him in his crib without him immediately crying.  Even if he's in a deep sleep, he wakes up and starts wailing.  They're also back to their old habits of waking every 2hrs to eat.

Things came to a head about 5am one morning.  Zach refused to sleep in his crib, even though he was really tired.  I had been working with him for 1.5hrs, feeding, changing his diaper, and holding him.  Jim had also taken his turn trying to get him down.  At our wits end, we just put him in his crib and let him cry.  I felt terrible and he screamed in anger for about 45min before going to sleep.  Alex was also put down and cried.  After an hour I got him up.

The actual Christmas festivities went pretty well, though.  We went to Jim's grandma's for Christmas Eve dinner and present opening.  Jim and I were both surprised at how much the boys seemed to like ripping the paper off their gifts and playing with the contents.  You just had to get things started then help them along when they go stuck.  They got a book, kids keys, and outfits from Grandma Pat.  Great Grandmama got them a musical ball and stacker rings that light up.

So, once we got home and put the boys to bed, I decided we should probably have wrapped their presents from us after all.  I clad their smaller toys and books in festive tissue paper.  We also took everything out of their boxes and had toys assembled for ease of play later on.  Patience is not on the list of things the boys are good at.  hehe

We stacked all of their gifts in front of the fireplace, while loot from my family occupied the space under the tree.  The highlights from us were a xylophone, ball pit, sorting blocks, pop up pals, hand bells, and an activity table.  My family got them stuffed animals that sing/count/say the alphabet, many many books (including 2 that my mom recorded herself reading!), balls they can grab, a driving toy, and a piano toy.  It took Alex and Zach about 1.5hrs to unwrap everything.  It was incredibly cute how they would tear the paper off and put it to their mouths.  They wouldn't actually try to eat it most of the time, just feel it with their lips.  We would set the paper aside and once a toy was nekkid, each boy wanted to sit and play with it.

Later that morning we headed down to their cousins' house for brunch.  We had a good visit and left in the early evening.  The next day we all ventured out into the chaos to purchase a new gift for one of the nephews.  He had already gotten the car we got him, so we picked him up some trains.  It was cold, so we bundled the boys up in hats and blankets.  They really don't like putting on the hats, but forget about them once they're in place (unless they fall over their eyes).  We have matching mittens but haven't used them due to how much they like to chew on their fingers.

The Sunday after Christmas we met at Jim's dad's house for dinner.  Poppa recently had some surgery related to his prostate cancer so he was still in recovery mode.  I'm not sure if the whole family plus rambunctious kids were what the doctor ordered.  Either way, we opened even more gifts there.  The boys got stuffed sheep, a book, a ride-on giraffe, and wooden toys from Jim's brother's family.  Jim's sister and her son got them really cute outfits.  Poppa and Granny J got them some cloth books, pop 'n blocks, an activity table/exersaucer thing, and most of their new 12mo clothes.

We also found Jacques I!  Apparently he had been living on their mantle since Thanksgiving when we forgot him.  Jacques II really wasn't the same.  His beak was low on the stuffing, he had crooked feathers, and he just wasn't the first toy we had bought the boys.  So, now we have two peacocks.