Christmas 2012

Each year Christmas with kids gets more and more fun. Hannah gets it more and more each year. She’s so easily pleased and has genuine excitement. She’s not greedy. I had been planting in her mind that she wanted a kitchen for Christmas. When she sat on Santa’s lap she asked for a kitchen. When she returned to me I said, “What did you tell Santa you wanted?” She responded with the biggest smile on her face, “Mom, I asked for a kitchen, but he gave me a candy cane!” That could have been her whole Christmas and she would have been so happy. When does that change? When does Christmas become a chore? I hope never. Right now I love to spoil my kids with cheer, and activities, and presents.

I started out the season with 24 days of Christmas. Hannah got to open one present a day until Christmas. I loved doing this because it brought excitement to each day and helped me organize all the activities I wanted to do throughout the month. Most things were activities. Some were little gifts. Others toys we already had that she had forgotten about. In our 24 days of Christmas we went to Salt Lake to see the lights, rode the Lindon Polar Express, made cookies, went shopping for family members, etc.

Because we knew we’d be out of town for Christmas, we had a mini celebration a few days before we left with my parents.

We were going to California for Christmas and planned on leaving the Friday before Christmas. Earlier in the week, Jonathan decided he wanted to leave on Wednesday so we could go to the BYU Bowl game in San Diego on Thursday. So we packed up early and headed out. We stayed the night in St. George and Thursday afternoon dropped the kids off at his sister’s house. The Bowl game was really fun. We had fabulous seats (5^th row, 50 yard line) and the game got especially fun in the 4^th quarter. It’s always more fun when you win.

After the game we went back to his sisters to get the kids then headed to his parents. It made for a very long day (got up at 4:45 am and got to his parents around 1 am) but a very fun day. We spent the next week going to the beach, playing at the park, seeing the space shuttle and enjoying Christmas with family.

Christmas morning was pretty laid back. The oldest grandchild there was not quite 3 so while she and Hannah knew it was Christmas, and knew Santa had come, they were fine to eat breakfast and hang out upstairs until the adults were ready.

Everyone got what they asked for and then some. The big gifts were a kitchen for Hannah (delivered on New Year’s Day back at our house), a freezer for me (delivered 2 weeks before Christmas…more on this in a minute), and a tablet for Jonathan (not yet ordered – he got one, wasn’t here before we left, then decided he wanted a different one…so we’re in the process of returning and ordering again). I guess we actually kind of struggled to pull off Christmas ON Christmas this year. Jackson didn’t get 1 big thing…but lots of little toys that currently Hannah enjoys more than he does.

We headed back home to the cold on Thursday but finished up the weekend in St. George. Once we got home we were surprised to find out that two more of Jonathan’s siblings were in town. One of the families stayed with us for a few nights and we all went to a basketball game together.

I am sad that Christmas is over. Now it is just cold and icy and there isn’t much to look forward to. I loved having Jonathan not at work for 2 weeks. I could get used to that. Now it’s back to normal day living…which is pretty good too.

Oh, I have had job of stocking my new freezer.

About that – when did I transition from wanting fun things for myself to wanting things that make my family life easier? And when did I become such a cook? In college I did dinner group. This stressed me out beyond belief because I didn’t know how to cook. I would go to my mom’s house and get a casserole from her, slice up some bread and take all the credit. Now, I plan my meals out a month in advance and am always trying new recipes. This also means my new wants are all kitchen related. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve loved all my kitchen gifts I’ve gotten over the past few years…I just am surprised that these are my new wants. But, I’ve wanted a freezer for a while now. Like I said, I plan out my meals a month in advance now…many of which I had been wanting to make in advance when I do my one big shopping day but just didn’t have space to freeze them. So, I am thrilled to finally have plenty of room to store all my bulk purchases and freezer meals. It’s not full yet, but I think I’ve gotten a good start on it this past week.  So far I have 14 meals, about 30 pounds of cheese, 5 loaves of bread, over 100 sticks of butter, 4 pounds of bacon, a gallon of ice cream, 4 pizzas, and a hundred otter pops.

Updates on Hannah and Jackson

I have so much to catch up that I don’t know where to start. Who knew having two kids would be so much more time consuming? Perhaps it’s because Hannah is no longer taking naps (at least regularly) and Jackson never has taken naps…have I talked about that? Probably not, because I don’t have time to because he doesn’t nap. It’s a vicious cycle.

Jackson is now almost 9 months. Time has gone by so fast, yet it seems like he’s always been a part of our family. I don’t really remember life without him. I’m sure it was a simpler time. Jackson is so different from Hannah. SO different. At 9 months, Hannah was an awesome sleeper/napper (really that started at about 5 weeks). She was always content. If she couldn’t reach a toy – that was fine. She was content to just sit there. She especially loved a party where she could sit and listen and talk along with everyone else. She didn’t get into things, she didn’t throw things, she was on a totally predictable schedule; however if that schedule got changed, she went with the flow and adjusted. She was NO WHERE near crawling. Heck, she could barely roll at this stage. She was so easy.

Jackson is everything opposite. He is never content. He’s always reaching for, grabbing at, and throwing himself at anything he thinks he has a chance at getting. He pulls himself up onto his knees and is slowly figuring out crawling. I often find him in downward dog, sometimes resting on his hands, sometimes just on his head.  He will get up on all fours and scootch around. Eventually he’ll collapse and army crawl the rest of the way to get what he wants. He wrestles with toys that are much bigger than him and wrestles with his sister. He usually wins. He loves his jumper and bounces in it all day long.  Sometimes he even falls asleep in it.  I think for this child I’ll finally need to invest in a baby gate and some door locks. Perhaps finally get around to anchoring our bookshelves to the walls.  Maybe we’ll even have to lower the crib. That’s right. Hannah always slept with it on the highest spot because she never even attempted to climb out. I put her in the crib now and it doesn’t even cross her mind.

I don’t know which I prefer. Both are fun. Hannah was good and easy, but Jackson is adventurous and exciting. It just speaks to their personalities I guess.

As far as a schedule and sleeping…I do know which I prefer. Jackson has been very challenging because he is not a good sleeper. At New Years I resolved to stop feeding him at night. For some reason he decided to go back to his newborn ways and wake up every three hours. This had been going on for the past month. Prior to that the best we got was 9 hours at night…and that was only for 2 weeks. It’s now been a week and a half and it’s going quite well. The last two nights he hasn’t woken up. Hallelujah! Now I just need to figure out how to get him to nap. I’m lucky if over the entire day he sleeps for 1 ½ hours. That is usually broken up into 2-3 naps. I feel like I’ve tried everything. It wouldn’t be so bad if he would wake up happy, but he doesn’t. He cries the whole time he’s awake and rubs his eyes. I feed him to sleep – he doesn’t transfer. I rock him to sleep – he doesn’t transfer. I put him in wide awake and he cries for an hour. I put him in groggy and he cries for an hour. I’m at a loss.

Done complaining. He really is such a cute little boy and when he is happy he is such a delight. Hannah is the best at making him laugh and he tries to do everything she does. They pound the dinner table together, roar at one another, and laugh and each other laughing. I hope they will grow up to be great friends. Hannah encourages him to crawl and talks baby talk to him. Jackson loves to watch her run around…and then tries to steal her toys. This may become an issue soon. I don’t know where his blonde hair came from but I love it and I LOVE his big blue eyes.  We gave him a haircut the other day day and now he looks so much older, like a little boy. 

          

Hannah is growing up so much. Her favorite show is Doc McStuffins and she LOVES to play doctor. She will act out episodes verbatim. We are always getting check ups. When she is giving us check ups she talks to us like we’re babies and says, “It’ll be ok sweetie. Sweetie, what’s been bothering you? Don’t be scared.” My favorite is when I’m so sick that I have to spend the night in the “clinic”. This means I lay on the couch with a blanket and my eyes have to stay shut until she comes back to check on me. Her other favorite thing is to cook in the kitchen. Every morning she makes me breakfast and she is always asking me what she can make for me. I’m amazed at how much she watches me and copies me. The other day I was making enchiladas and she said, “Mom, I want some milk.” I told her I couldn’t get some for her right then because my hands were dirty, and I showed her my hands. A few minutes later she called from the other room saying, “Mom! Say, I want some milk!” (She often tells me what I need to say when we play) I said, “I want some milk,” and she came running in and said, “Sweetie, I know you want some milk, but I’m cooking right now and my hands are dirty, see. When I’m done I can get you some milk…ok sweetie? It’ll be ok.” And she ran back to her kitchen.

She also loves to read books.  She’ll get hooked one or two and always want us to read her those books.  It only takes 3 or 4 readings before she’s able to read us the book (kind of).  Currently it’s I’m not afraid of Dogs and Dinosaurumpus.