Okay, peeps. I’m going to try very hard to share a short post about the glorious early Christmas we celebrated on Monday! But it’s likely I’ve have to share a lot more thoughts and musings at a later date, when I have time to ruminate on all of it.
This gist of it is this: we’re enjoying such a new and different holiday, this year. Our first with all the kiddos in the know about Santa and our first not at our house or a relative’s house.
We’re off on an adventure (like, currently, as I type), which means our family celebration happened early, this year, with sort of an unhinged, anything-goes vibe!
None of the kiddos had any major gift requests on their list, this year, which was kind of amazing, because it meant I could go totally rogue!
And not only could I go totally rogue, but I could throw our traditional three gifts from Santa rule out the window and instead tackle a lot more, but a lot more (nine, to be exact!) inexpensive, gifts of my own, random choosing!
It was really fun to accumulate really unique presents the kiddos had never even mentioned, and then to wrap them and start piles that could drive them nuts during the month of December.
Definitely new and fun for us, since we’ve spent 13 Christmases hiding things away in closets and attics and then frantically wrapping and prepping on Christmas Eve.
The kiddos even decided to have an adorable sibling sleepover on our faux “Christmas Eve,” even though they didn’t necessarily have to wake up and do the whole Santa thing. :)
In fact, the whole shebang was so wheels off and create-your-own-adventure style that the hubby and I went to pickleball and Barre class, respectively, while the kiddos were still getting up and at ‘em, and then set a 10 am start time for the unwrapping festivities!
There was still sooooo much of the joy without the angst of a go-go-go wake-up and unwrapping extravaganza!
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It has to be said that most of the gleeful adoration shown in the pics above came from presents based on BOOKS. Both girlies received a ton of merch (including those sweatshirts) related to books series they adore and that makes my heart so stinking happy! And theirs, apparently!
Little Man’s favorite gift was a gaming headset that allows him to chat with only his approved buddies from school while he’s gaming and he lit up like a Christmas Tree light bulb when we set it up and he synced up with a friend. :)
Now, after all the glorious gifting, we went out for a lunch excursion—with our Coda girl in tow! We ate a lovely crepe lunch outdoors, gave the kiddos a small budget to do some shopping and had a mortifying (for the kiddos) parent-mandated photo with Santa. First, because I wanted a Coda Santa pic, and, second, because I thought it would be a hysterical full circle moment now that they all know about the magic.
When we made it home, everyone was pretty wiped—Coda girl, included!—but I sat to work making our traditional lasagnas and we did our whole dining room dinner.
Again, I’ll have sooooo much more to share on the subject when I have a bit of time and distance to do a holiday recap, but for now, I’ll just say that I am
not mad at these beautiful life changes as the kiddos age.
Okay, SO much more as adventures abound!
MERRY CHRISTMAS, peeps!
Over and out.
