{"id":1480,"date":"2010-12-28T10:18:58","date_gmt":"2010-12-28T18:18:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/xangelle.com\/dailygrind\/?p=1480"},"modified":"2010-12-27T16:38:03","modified_gmt":"2010-12-28T00:38:03","slug":"christmas-morning","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/xangelle.com\/dailygrind\/christmas-morning\/","title":{"rendered":"Christmas Morning"},"content":{"rendered":"

For all of the ups and downs that this year brought, Christmas was so amazing.<\/p>\n

I’m so aware of all that we “have” as a family, in having each other and I’m so thankful that we were all together to share our love between each other. <\/p>\n

The baby was the first one to wake up. He started hollering for some attention at 6:40am. I was pleasantly surprised to see that none of the other kids were awake. Last year, none of the kids woke up before 7am and so it wasn’t completely out of the ordinary, but all the memories I have of Christmas morning, involve insanely early hours of waiting and waiting and waiting. I’m thrilled that my kids “sleep in” but think it’s a little abnormal, no?<\/p>\n

Anyhow, we managed to get in a diaper change and a nursing session before Xandra came up stairs at 7:20am wondering if she was allowed to wake up the other kids and get their stockings.<\/p>\n

Josiah wandered into our room moments after Xani and then she went and woke Jeremy up. The three older kids headed downstairs to get their stockings.<\/p>\n

We had decided to let Geli sleep in, if she could, as sleep is a precious, but fleeting commodity for her, these days. The steroid that she’s on has the ability to mess, horribly, with her sleep and so if she can sleep….we let her. Cause another side effect of the steroid is moodiness and if you combine moodiness with sleeplessness….well, it’s just not a pretty picture. Add in 2-3 loud noisy children who make repetitive and often annoying noises and you have an AWESOME recipe for some serious meltdowns….and so the plan was to let her sleep in. Unfortunately, Geli had been awake every half and hour since 3am and was so tired but just couldn’t sleep. It’s so hard when things like this happen, because there is not much we can do. And we’re left to sit beside her, watching her suffer.<\/p>\n

\"Opening<\/a><\/center><\/p>\n

The kids spread themselves all over the floor and went to work on their stockings. The squeals and giggles indicating that they were fully enjoying themselves.<\/p>\n

\"Finger<\/a><\/center><\/p>\n

This was Judah’s first Christmas and while he’s a little young to understand what’s going on, he totally enjoyed watching the joyous chaos that surrounded him. <\/p>\n

\"Just<\/a><\/center><\/p>\n

Josiah is showing off the onion that he found in his stocking. In my family, we always got a carrot, or potato or onion in our stocking. It was always funny to be searching through your stocking and to come across this totally-out-of-place item. <\/p>\n

\"Traditional<\/a><\/center><\/p>\n

This year, my dad explained the background behind the veggie in the stocking. Apparently when he was a little boy, finances were tight and his mom used the veggie as a stocking filler and he carried the tradition on with his family. We never knew this growing up. All we knew was that it was hilarious to find a potato in the toe of our stocking on Christmas morning.<\/p>\n

After the kids finish with their stockings, we make them freshen up a bit by brushing their teeth, combing hair and putting on clothes but this year I was a little lenient with the “go and put daytime clothes on” rule. Then, we have breakfast together. The kids love and want to eat those little tiny boxes of cereal. We normally set the table up really fancy and have a nice family breakfast. This year we didn’t go quite so fancy. It was a more relaxed, laid back morning and that was nice too.<\/p>\n

\"Eating<\/a><\/center><\/p>\n

Jon and Geli were just taking it easy. I’m so proud of this beautiful, young woman. She is walking through a horrific journey with grace and courage and strength. <\/p>\n

\"Geli<\/a><\/center><\/p>\n

While Jon and the kids had sugar cereal. I ate the most disgusting gluten free cinnamon bun. It wasn’t that it was even that gross tasting, but that it had the consistency of cardboard. Cardboard drenched in sugary icing. BLECH! Judah was LOVING his pears with cocoa powder.<\/p>\n

\"MMMMMmm<\/a><\/center><\/p>\n

While we cleaned up from Breakfast, Jeremy had a quiet moment and if you know him at all you’ll understand why this particular event is worth mentioning and posting a photo of.<\/p>\n

\"Quiet<\/a><\/center><\/p>\n

Finally, it was time to “OPEN PRESENTS”. The kids all find themselves a “spot” that the designate as theirs. <\/p>\n

\"Getting<\/a><\/center><\/p>\n

And then Jon passes the gifts out.<\/p>\n

\"Jon<\/a><\/center><\/p>\n

This year, Jeremy was SOOOOOO excited about the gift that he was giving to Jon and he wanted Jon to open it right away.<\/p>\n

\"Jon's<\/a><\/center><\/p>\n

Jon unwrapped and unwrapped and unwrapped and unwrapped and soon there was a HUGE pile of paper at his feet. Finally, that HUGE present turned into….<\/p>\n

\"It's<\/a><\/center><\/p>\n

While Jon passed out presents and I snapped pictures, we used the BEST hands free device EVER. We put the Baby into a box….<\/p>\n

\"Baby<\/a><\/center><\/p>\n

Doesn’t everyone do this???? For baby’s that aren’t quite sitting steadily on their own…..He “can” sit, but often wobbles from side to side (and falls over). This Rubbermaid bin keeps him sitting, makes sure he doesn’t tip over, and all his toys are within arms reach inside the box. It’s GENIUS as far as I’m concerned.<\/p>\n

We even gave him a present to open…<\/p>\n

\"What's<\/a><\/center><\/p>\n

He wasn’t entirely sure what to do with it at first, but very quickly he figured out exactly what it was for……<\/p>\n

\"Who<\/a><\/center><\/p>\n

And Man….was that ribbon ever delicious!<\/p>\n

\"Lego\"<\/a><\/center><\/p>\n

Thanks to the generosity of some amazing people our children were so SO blessed this year. (more about that to come in an upcoming post<\/em>)<\/p>\n

\"Scrapbooking\"<\/a><\/center><\/p>\n

Josiah was given this sweet baseball cap and he looks so adorable, doesn’t he?<\/p>\n

\"Cool<\/a><\/center><\/p>\n

This was such a fabulous Christmas and we were and are so blessed. <\/p>\n

\"Happy\"<\/a><\/center><\/p>\n

I hope you had a wonderful Christmas. We are so thankful for health and life and the blessings of each other and of all you wonderful people in our lives.<\/p>\n

If you don’t mind sharing, what was the best part of your Christmas Day?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For all of the ups and downs that this year brought, Christmas was so amazing. I’m so aware of all that we “have” as a family, in having each other and I’m so thankful that we were all together to share our love between each other. The baby was the first one to wake up. … Continue reading “Christmas Morning”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[20,12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1480","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-christmas","category-family"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/xangelle.com\/dailygrind\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1480","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/xangelle.com\/dailygrind\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/xangelle.com\/dailygrind\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xangelle.com\/dailygrind\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xangelle.com\/dailygrind\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1480"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/xangelle.com\/dailygrind\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1480\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1488,"href":"https:\/\/xangelle.com\/dailygrind\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1480\/revisions\/1488"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/xangelle.com\/dailygrind\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1480"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xangelle.com\/dailygrind\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1480"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xangelle.com\/dailygrind\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1480"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}