The stockings are hung

The stockings have been hung for weeks now but I can't believe that this time tomorrow night they will be filled with various things and the traditional orange in each toe. Is it really Christmas Eve in a matter of hours? Yesterday Ethan had his Christmas program at school. It was very cute and he did a great job. Driving around town after the program, with the snow swirling and Christmas tunes streaming in made it truly feel like Christmas, finally. Christmas really is coming! The kids are excited and so am I.

It's so fun to have kids this age that "get it", and yes both Santa and at a very basic level for now, the real reason we celebrate Christmas. Maybe the birthday cake isn't such a bad idea after all? I hadn't put any gifts under the tree for various reasons but then decided having a few out might help give incentive for good behavior. Within a few hours Kate had already unwrapped one of them so away they went.

I've been thinking about believing in Santa a lot lately. There is something magical about believing. I am sad to think that the day will come sooner than later when Ethan will ask me if "He" is real. I can still remember the day I found out that Santa wasn't real. I asked my Mom and thought she would deny it but she confirmed my fear. I think that moment is a sudden coming of age and you start to look at things very differently. So, I have decided that my answer to that question will always and forever be "yes, there is a Santa Claus." I don't see any harm in having my children believe in something that puts a face on giving and bringing happiness and Joy. They will find out in time that "the man in the red suit" may not exist but the season for giving is alive and well. I don't want to be the one to disappoint them when they may not really be ready or want to know the answer to that question. A friend gave me an article this week that I really liked. A granddaughter asked her grandmother if Santa was real and her answer was a very strong "Yes". She then took her granddaughter to a department store and gave her 10$ to spend on anyone. The girl chose a boy in her class that did not own a coat. The young girl picked a nice coat and gave it to the clerk to buy with her 10 dollars. When she got home her grandmother helped her wrap and deliver it in secret to this boy. The girl found the tag later and realized the coat was actually 20 dollars so the clerk had been generous as well. After the delivery of the coat and listening from a distance to the reaction of the young boy her grandmother told her "see, Santa does exist". I really liked that and hope to teach that concept to my children as they grow past Santa as they currently know him. Each year we try to help someone in some small way. It was good for the kids this year to see gifts that they would enjoy themselves,being wrapped for children who would not otherwise have gifts under their tree. I hope that each year we can be more and more generous and teach our children how important it is to think of others and see how very, very blessed we are. My heart breaks as I hear on the news or read in the newspaper of the many families out of work, or staying in homeless shelters. The numbers have increased dramatically this year. It brings renewed perspective of those things most important. I'm so grateful to be blessed with the knowledge of our Savior and his birth. Hope you have a magical and Merry Christmas!

Finding balance and JOY

It's just 11 days until Christmas and I can hardly believe it. We have done a lot of fun and festive things but I know that it will come and go and I will hardly believe it happened. I am trying to focus on the now, and what is and not what could be or should be. We are so blessed and it will have a great Christmas. It's hard for me at times to find the balance between the kids being excited Christmas morning about the things they receive and yet not be spoiled all at the same time. I of course more importantly want them to understand why we are celebrating this special holiday. I read yesterday of a family who makes an actual birthday cake to reinforce to their children that it's Christ's birthday we are celebrating. Admittedly the idea seems a tad casual and irreverent to me,singing happy birthday to Jesus, but maybe it would help them understand. What do you think? I'm not sure that's something I'm going to embrace this year anyway.

The kids are in the middle of all of their school activities decorating gingerbread men and gift exchanges. I'm kind of glad they have those things so I don't feel as much pressure to have so many activities planned at home. Due to weather we weren't able to get up to SLC to see the lights so I still really want to do that. This weekend we are having our Wilson family Christmas party, and then next week I think Rand is going to try to go to the BYU bowl game. I hope he can make it work out with his work schedule. He rarely does something fun that's just for him. We are still contemplating our Christmas Eve plans, right now we thinking we are going to have a dinner and then go see all the luminaries in Alpine that night. We will track Santa on line and scatter reindeer food and leaves cookies for Santa of course. It's just stressful to me wanting everything to be magical. I want my children to have bright memories of their childhood Christmas's. I guess I need to remember that it wasn't the gifts or the foods we ate or activities we did when I was young, I just remember being together as a family. These days having the blessing of a Mom and Dad and brothers and sisters happily together in a warm home with groceries in the pantry is more than most people will enjoy this Christmas.

A few of my favorite things...

Getting Ms. Kate up in the morning is one of those things that gives me a warm fuzzy. You walk in and she is never mad, never crying, and usually says something cute like "hi mom, can you change my diaper?" Then she often stands up and starts to jump and jump and jump and then as soon as you try to get her out she makes a dive for it and ends up lying down again and then we repeat over and over again. It makes my morning happy. I often think I should probably put a monitor in her room because I often don't even know when she awakens because she just plays, or sings or jumps until we go and get her. She, like my other children is one of my favorite things.

On Sunday she tried and tried and finally escaped out of the pew, past my leg after climbing higher and higher over it. She gave me that look like "I did it, I got out!" and then quietly and casually proceeded to the back of the chapel all along the way waving to each family in each pew waving and saying "hello, hello" like she was the appointed greeter. I looked back to see what she was up to and witnessed this cute scene. She wasn't really being disruptive and each family she passed got bigger and bigger smiles on their faces as she passed them with her greeting.

She is very much into the "trying two's" and tries my patience on occasion. She recently has spent her share of time-out in our laundry room. Initially she was quite upset but yesterday after several time outs for hitting she discovered that if she clanked the glass bottles of canned peaches we have in there, I would quickly open the door to make sure she wasn't breaking anything. So after about the 2nd or 3rd time in there, as soon as I would close the door for her timeout she wouldn't fuss at all but immediatelely start her clanking. I couldn't believe how smart she is and how well she had trained me to open the door to interrupt her time out.

We are exciting for the holidays and think the kids are at such a fun age. They all still believe in the Magic of Santa and get excited about the smallest things. Tonight we are hoping to go see the lights at temple square if the weather will cooperate. Just one more of my favorite things.