Merry Christmas!

I wonder how many blog posts begin with that title at this time of year. It was a wonderful few days. This time of year is always particularly crazy for Mike and me. In this month we have our two birthdays, Christmas, and our anniversary (what were we thinking?!). Mike's birthday, Christmas, and our anniversary actually all occur in one crazy week! Sometimes I just feel like we are jumping from one thing to the next, but the past few days have been really great. Yesterday we went sledding, made some treats for neighbors and had a great time. Today, we waited around for the much-publicized big bad storm that has finally now arrived. We had debated visiting family because we didn't want to get caught in the storm (that happened to us on Christmas about 5 years ago and it was terrible), but when Holly was throwing up this morning...yes, Merry Christmas (she threw up once yesterday too), that sealed the deal and we stayed home. Initially I thought I would really dislike having to stay home. It's Christmas, we all want to be out visiting family. It turned out to be wonderful. I helped Owen build his new train track, helped kids with mp3 players, paints, made cupcakes with Brooklyn and Holly, played 'p-wii' (that stands for pseudo-wii) with Mike, took a nap, and relaxed. I stayed in my pjs all day long and don't even feel bad about it. That's part of the wonder of Christmas...you are supposed to relax and enjoy. Here's a few pics of the festivities.



I also had the satisfaction today of reaping the rewards of my labors. In a moment of insanity (I have those frequently), I decided to sew the kids some robes...Brooklyn and Matthew had still been using the hooded towels that they had as babies and needless to say, they weren't giving much coverage anymore. Mike pointed out that I couldn't very well make robes for the older two without making robes for the younger two...so I was into it (and this was Thanksgiving weekend that I decided to do it) 4 robes. Then I decided it wouldn't be that hard to make matching pajama pants for everyone and so I bought some flannel and made some for the boys and some for the girls (Mike and I included) and sewed them up. Obviously, I've been sewing in all my spare time and trading sleep for sewing for the last couple of weeks. The kids loved it last night when they got to open their pjs before bed (despite having done this as a tradition in my family growing up, we'd never done it with our own children). And tonight, I heard many comments of "Thanks for the really warm robe, Mom, I love it!" Maybe the sleepless nights were worth it after all. What I want to know is how did my mom do 7 pairs of pajamas every year?

I hope your Christmas was wonderful too (who knew that I would be posting about our "sick" Christmas and saying how wonderful it was?)! Merry Christmas!