Merry Christmas!
Our Christmas festivities began Christmas Eve with the usual reading of Luke 2 while we "acted" out the parts.
Each year it is very much an impromptu type of play; deciding who will play which part right before. It was decided that I would play Mary since I am great with child, and the other parts took a bit of persuasion. Rachel cast her vote first for the shepherd and Elizabeth to be an angel. Sarah also wanted to be the "guy who watches the sheep", that was not OK with Rachel, she wanted to be the lone shepherd. We almost had Sarah convinced to be a wiseman because she would get to hold a pretty gift for baby Jesus, then Elizabeth decided she wanted that part. It didn't take much to convince Sarah to be the angel once we told her she could wear her beloved white tutu.
As usual our play was more of a comedy that a historical reenactment. As the angel was introduced and brought good news to the shepherds, the first of the wiseman also came to visit the Christ child. I say visit, because he sat down at Mary's feet and played with the gift he had brought for Jesus. It was pretty funny. The angel wanted to hold the baby, so much so that I think she did all night and even slept with "baby Jesus".
We should have tucked them right into bed after this because they were so calm and quiet, but we made the mistake of this being first on our Christmas Eve agenda. They got sillier and sillier as the evening went along.
Elizabeth played her repertoire of Christmas songs on the piano, the one she learned for recital and the others she taught herself. I felt a little bad for her because at one point there was laughter to be heard from her three siblings as they were giggling about something. She just played right along ignoring them all.
Just before leaving a plate of goodies for Santa I needed to take the traditional Christmas Eve picture with the kids holding their stockings, all ready to be tucked in bed where sugar plums could dance in their heads. It was no easy task this year. They were letting their true colors shine through. Sarah kept playing peek-a-boo with her stocking, John seemed to blink in every picture from the flash, Elizabeth kept making funny faces and Rachel was growing impatient at how long and how many pictures we were having to take.
In a moment like this of taking pictures of your kids, you have three choices, get really angry, give up or laugh. Seeing that it was Christmas Eve I chose the later, to laugh. As John and Sarah proceeded to put their stockings on their heads, arms and other body parts I just laughed, so much that I couldn't take a picture. Looking back I wish I would have snapped a few despite the laughter. We finally did get one that will represent Christmas Eve 2012.
As they awaited to discover what Santa brought them on Christmas morning John had a "slumber party" in Rachel and Sarah's room. Perhaps not such a good idea. It took much longer than usual for the kiddos to settle down and go to sleep, I knew there was a reason that John had his own room besides being the only boy in the house. But to sleep they finally did.
Christmas morning to my surprise started later than expected . . . at the normal wake-up time of 6am. The kids had instructions to come to our room before wandering into the living room. They were very obedient, despite having to walk past the living room to get to our room. They were sure excited when they came in and climbed onto our bed. Telling us all about how there were presents by the fireplace.
I don't think a single child was disappointed by their gift, but instead their were smiles and squeals all around.
Legos for Rachel . . .
We spent the rest of the day in our jammies playing with toys, taking naps, watching movies and relaxing and enjoying being with one another. It was a fabulous Christmas!
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