Well, I think this is the most excited I've been about Christmas in a long time...the anticipation for Drew's excitement is just about all I can think about! It's been fun sharing the story of Christmas with the boys, and seeing how much or little Drew picks up and understands. One of the first Sundays of December his Sunday School class learned about the first part of the story...when I asked Drew what they learned about, he emphatically moved his hand from side to side and said "NO MORE ROOM!" Ok, so he got that part!
I took Drew to Benbrook's annual Christmas kick off - every year Santa rides into the park on a firetruck and they light up their Winter Wonderland display and set off fireworks. Drew was pretty excited about and waved his mightiest as Santa & Mrs. Claus rode by. He was pretty stunned when the fireworks started - I could tell he liked how they looked, but did not like the sound! So, we slowly made our way back to the car - we could still see them of course, but were getting further away from the noise, which Drew liked. When I asked him later if the fireworks were pretty, he said, "No, the lights in the sky go boom!...Too loud!" But I think he liked them overall...we ended the night driving around the neighborhood looking at the Christmas lights - that he loved for sure!
I took the boys to get Santa pictures, and took my niece Taron for back up...I knew that was at best a 50/50 shot of getting Drew to cooperate, so I thought Taron could handle Noah and I'd deal with Drew. But he was all excited about it, getting all sorts of giddy talking about it. He even knew he wanted to ask Santa for a camera. Well, the excitement lasted until we were next in line, and then the fear and hesitation set in...as we were walking toward Santa, Drew was using all his might to get as far as possible from him while still staying in my arms. Noah, as you can see, was perfectly fine. Drew wouldn't even take the picture with me next to Santa. He just wouldn't have it...oh well. It will always be a special memory for me regardless. When we were waiting to get the picture printed, Drew told Taron "I took picture with Santa, but I not!" Translation: I was supposed to take a picture with Santa, but there's no way I was going to do that! I guess we'll see what next year brings!
Grandma Palmer helped both Luke & Drew celebrate the Christmas season this year with tons of books about the Christmas story, winter, etc. - one book to unwrap each day from December 1 to 25! It was lots of fun to see which story we would get each day. She also had the boys over to make sugar cookies - now that was funny! Drew helped me roll out the dough, and then attacked it with a cookie cutter - so I of course had to go back and do some repairs! When it was time to decorate, he loved painting on the egg-wash, bu my slightly texture-defensive child wanted nothing to do with the sprinkles - it led to screaming and throwing a fit & running away from the cookies. That is, until Luke showed Drew his cookies, and then he was perfectly fine with it - so much so that his cookies were COMPLETELY covered in sprinkles! That kid is a trip!
The weekend of Christmas we packed up the car and drove to Houston to be with Grandpa, Nana and Uncle Kevin for 4 days. The boys did great traveling. We drove through Austin on the way down to see Denise & Emmeline that were in town from North Carolina for the holidays - it was a nice treat to see them and get a break from the car too! We had such a wonderful time in Houston with the family. We kept it pretty low-ket and just played with the boys as much as we could...it was very nice! We made some fun, yummy Christmas treats (Pinterest inspired of course!) and really just enjoyed each other's company. Drew was fun to watch open presents...his reaction was more of a "Huuuuuuuuhhhhhh!" (Sucking in his breath, excited, I can't believe it, kind of reaction - pretty funny! I don't remember how it all happened, but he somehow started taking a bow over and over again and saying "Thank you, Thank you"! Where that came from, I don't know if we'll ever know! What a hoot! We were sad when the weekend was over, and packed to the brim in the car thanks to the over generosity of the family & extended families! The boys slept almost the whole way back home, which was fabulous!
We got back home Monday night, unloaded the car and made sure the living room was clear for Christmas in the morning. Drew had a blast opening up all his gifts & helping Noah with his too of course! Our house was a HUGE mess! We had so much fun shopping for the boys this year...a little too much fun really. It was fun to see what excited Drew, and what he could have cared less about. But he was pretty interested in most things, wanting to get everything out of the boxes immediately and play. He was bouncing from toy to toy all day...it obviously was exhausting having so much fun!
We went to the Palmer's house that evening for Christmas with them. They are such a loving and fun family to be with, it was great for us all to be together. We had a yummy dinner and then opened more gifts! They were too generous as always - Drew was so wired from it all, he was hard to control. But he loved all his new toys & playing with Luke best of all! Noah got to be held lots, so he of course liked that! :) It was a late night, but lots of fun - love that Palmer family!
The rest of week was spent trying to get the house back to normal. My one big regret from this year was not taking advantage of our family time that week between Christmas and New Years. As is usually the case, I was too to-do list oriented and didn't slow down to enjoy the time the 4 of us could have spent together...hopefully this will be a lesson learned for all the Christmas's to come. And as for New Year's, well, we were exhausted, as parents of 2 small children are...we were in bed by 10pm, and up at 6 or so...about the opposite of how I'd choose, but again, these boys are worth it!
