Taylor, Matthew & Brayden: Christmas in Seattle

Whew! The holidays are behind us. What a fun-filled, chaotic, stressful, busy, loving, festive year it was. Between traveling over Thanksgiving, working part-time, hosting a friend for a week, taking care of Taylor and Matty, shopping, baking, decorating, cleaning, throwing a Christmas Eve-Eve party for 30 people, having Tommy's family over on Christmas Eve/Christmas Day, and then having my parents in town from Christmas Night until 1/7, I'm wiped! I am starting to understand why so many people look forward to the end of the Christmas season. I'm not there yet, but I have more clarity after this year.

Seeing Christmas through the eyes of a child is priceless, as most of you know. Taylor was so amped for Christmas this year. I just loved hearing her talk about Santa, Rudolph, and Elvis, our "Elf on the Shelf." She is at such an impressionable age. I am already looking forward to next Christmas when she'll understand the traditions and memories we are making even more.

My favorite part of Christmas this year was waking Taylor up on Christmas morning (she slept until 8:00!). I asked her if she had heard Santa, and she very seriously nodded her head and said, "Yes, I did. He was up on the roof. Then he came down the chimney, ate my cookies, took the carrots to his reindeer, and flew up in the sky!" Of course, you would have to hear the cute inflection in Taylor's voice to truly appreciate her recollection. If I didn't know better, I would have believed her! Tommy's parents and brother spent the night, so we all gathered at the top of our stairs before going down to see what Santa had left. Obviously, Taylor was super excited to see all of the presents.

I promised myself that I would keep Christmas simple this year. I was disgusted at the amount of stuff we gifted/received last year, and I did not want that to become the expectation. Gifts are not what Christmas is all about, right? Well, after this year, I have a long way to go to teach that to Taylor. Taylor is at an age where it is easy to buy for her. Anytime I walk into a store and see something with princesses on it, I naturally want to buy it for my little princess. While Taylor did not receive any big gifts this year (unlike the play kitchen Santa brought her last year), she received a bunch of little things - princess dolls, princess dress-up clothes, jewelry, slippers, books, movies, flashlights, pajamas, etc. It was too, too much. I was also sensitive to Taylor having more gifts than Matty, so I went to great lengths to ensure he had the same number of presents. I had to wrap up puffs, pacifiers, and diaper cream for him, but at least there was an equal number of gifts. What I had not considered was that Matty would not open one gift by himself - and he even went down for his morning nap while we were opening gifts. As a result, we opened Matty's gifts for three or four days after Christmas. How annoying! I even saved a few of Taylor's for her to open after my parents arrived because she reached a point on Christmas morning where she was over-stimulated and un-appreciative of anything more. I need to flag this post so that I re-read it before the holidays next year. Less is more, Ali. Less is more.

On Christmas Eve-Eve, Tommy and I started what we hope will become an annual tradition. We had several close friends over for a potluck dinner. This included a lot of Tommy's high school friends, their parents, and their children (ranging in age from 6 months to 4 years old) All of the kiddos came in their Christmas jammies, and we hope that next year we can show them Polar Express or another Christmas movie while the adults enjoy some cocktails. The party was ultra-chaotic with the sheer number of people in our house along with the kids, babies, diaper bags, sippy cups, snacks, bottles of wine, serving platters, and coats. But it was fun. We are already scheming for next year.

This the best kiddo picture taken. Poor Matty was very overwhelmed by all the people and noise.

Group shot at the Christmas Eve-Eve party

On Christmas Eve, we "relaxed" during the day before heading to church for the 5:00 service. It was a zoo! We rushed home from church and had Tommy's parents and brother Brian over for dinner. Fortunately, our dinner this year was leftover ham and sides from the night before. We had "Happy Birthday Jesus" cake after dinner. Then we set out cookies, milk, and carrots for Santa, got our jammies on, and read "Was the Night Before Christmas." After the kiddos went to bed, we set out all of our gifts, made drinks, and watched "Christmas Vacation."

My kiddos on Christmas Eve

Singing Happy Birthday to Baby Jesus. Taylor blew out his candles for him.

Setting out cookies and milk for Santa

Reading "The Night Before Christmas"

We spent Christmas morning at our house opening gifts and sipping coffee. Sounds relaxing, right? It wasn't! :) After naptime, we headed over to Tommy's parents' house for a few more gifts and dinner. Uncle Brian cooked short ribs for us - they were incredible (ask Matty!). After we put Taylor and Matty to bed that night, I picked my parents up from the airport. The four of us (my parents, Tommy, and me) capped off the holiday with a glass of wine before we all crashed around midnight. It was a great holiday filled with lots of love and time with friends and family.