12 Days Of Christmas

Or the 12 days of Yule as we like to celebrate (a little surprising Dave embracing the pagan holiday traditions like he does with as environmental as he has always been but I think with his up bringing of hunting and gardening it comes naturally for him to appreciate all that nature has provided for his family), although even that started early for us this year. Our numerous days of celebration started the week before Christmas with Dave's mom coming for a nice long visit. Her time spent here was greatly appreciated by all as it always is but this year the timing of her visit was impeccable and I don't think I would have made it without her. This year was special for us as it was the first time we were hosting the festivities at our house for all of my mom's family. Mindy flew in right before everyone arrived and helped out tremendously with cooking, cleaning and shopping for us to help get us ready! The kids loved every moment spent with her as they usually do. Amongst all of her help around the house she still managed to play racquetball with the older boys, watch Aubriel's gymnastics class and bring the boys to school each morning. I am sure she left here needing a vacation from her vacation!The kids made snowflakes for her for Christmas!Watching more Christmas specials.Mindy had to fly back home on Thursday night which also happened to be the 20th of Dec. which is the first night of Yule know as Mother Night. Dave and I had plans to burn our Yule log which traditionally should be given to you as a gift or cut down yourself so since we had such a large Christmas tree and Dave had to trim so much off the bottom we thought we would use that as our Yule log. However by the time Dave got home from work, saw his mom off at the airport, ate dinner, cleaned up a bit more for the incoming family the next day and got the kids ready for the finally day of school the next morning it was bedtime and we never got around to it. This saddened me so which I know is not that big of a deal but I was looking forward to a nice quite evening with just our family to kick off the week of holidays... oh well.

Friday came so quickly and I think my family knocking on my door happened even faster! My mom had scheduled pictures at the studio she works at since ALL the family was to be together for the first time in... I think six years. So being that it was set for 1 PM I thought we had plenty of time to make it to our Chiro appointment before meeting everyone there BUT I think the first of them got here at 10 am. It turned out to be fine though since my parents came over soon after and they were all able to get in to the studio sooner. The night was spent with everyone breaking into two groups for dinner to accommodate the picky eaters and then we all went bowling. I of course forgot my camera! But it was SO much fun! The only thing missing was my brother and his family who arrived late that night at my parents.

The next morning our "real" Christmas began, once again at the studio for the BIG family picture now that everyone was here and then it was off to our house for the celebration... or the gift opening craziness since I think that is all my Grandma looks forward to. We actually had to tease Grandma since she is definitely our "heart" of Christmas and always has been. She shops ALL year long for this holiday. The amount of wrapped presents is insane, it seriously is something one can only imagine. My parents went and picked up most of them in Nov. and filled the back of their pick up truck... and that wasn't even all of them! So Dave was in the kitchen getting lunch in the oven and my Grandma keeps coming in asking if we are almost ready to open gifts. She kept saying the kids were getting impatient which was hysterical since her youngest grandchild is 15 and seemed to be doing just fine and all of her Great-Grand kids were in the basement playing with each other since it was the first time they had seen one another in a few months. But we all know Grandma just can't wait for the gift opening to begin each year, I suppose when that much planning goes into it who wouldn't be able to wait, right? My Mom, sister-in-law Jen and cousin Amanda

My cousin's Amber and Austin

My Dad and Brother

Me with my cousin's Amanda and Amber, Amanda and I use to to babysit Amber and now she is all grown up!

My Brother, Brian and his wife Jen

My cousin Nathan and his girlfriend Keri with Aubriel

Finally after we tortured Grandma enough it started! We do not take turns watching everyone open their gifts, we do not wait even until all gifts are pasted out and there is NOTHING organized about this gift giving exchange. This shocked Dave the first time he watched this take place as I am sure Jen and my cousin's new husband, Jeff, experienced their first time witnessing this as well but I think it would take two days just to get through the gifts if we did that. Someone starts taking presents from the pile and passes them out, when you have nothing to open you start going through the pile and bring it to the person as you read each one, that is our format and always has been. I have found it is best to try to sit in one place and wait for various people to bring your things to open, then you open it quickly before you get buried beneath your gifts which will happen quickly as Dave soon learned if you don't keep opening.



Brody with Aunt Jen


Grandma with her Living Dead Doll, she collects dolls and has over 7000 in her VERY small home! When my mom and I shopped for this I think the girl was surprised when we said it was a gift for "Grandma" and was even more surprised when we said we wouldn't need a gift receipt because we knew she wouldn't return it even if she didn't like it!
Brody's favorite gift... a bag on his head! Just think of all the money wasted on real gifts.

Our dear friend's Jason and Jessica (Aubriel's God-parents) who ARE family in our book were able to join us which was wonderful!
Amanda and I followed Her daughter, Jillian and Brody around for two days trying to get a pictures of them together since the last time they were together they were in our bellies yet... this was I think the only good one we got.

Brody with his God-mother, Amanda and a very unhappy Jillian

Aubriel doing a puppet show for Brody



Sunday was pretty quite for our family as everyone went home and my Brother and his family went to see Jen's Family for the day. We let the kids open some more gifts from us, like they needed them. And Dave and I finally got around to burning our Yule log. After burning half of it Dave took it outside and put it in the snow to save the rest to start our Yule log next year as is tradition.

Aubriel wearing her new outfit from Uncle Brian and Aunt Jen and her cousins

My brother stayed with us both Sat. and Sun. night which was great to have them here again since it had been so long with them living a ways away. The kids all got to play and Dave got to catch up with his best friend. Christmas Eve morning all of us went out for breakfast before Brian and Jen headed for home. It think it was the first time in a long time my parents had us ALL out to eat, it must have been quite the sight with my brother's four boys and my four kids.
Three of Brian's boys, (Bayne Griffon) with Gage (their youngest Tag)
Kain and Quillon were on the other side of the table
Aubriel pouting because I am taking pictures of the boys and not her

The whole table minus me

After they got on the road back to IN we went up north to see my Dad's side of the family for a few hours.

My kids with MY cousins who happen to be the same age as them.

We got back home around 8 PM Christmas Eve night and soon after Dave and I fell sick, not just sniffles sick but throwing up flu sick. Aubriel had a small bout of puking Thursday night followed by Brody on Sat. night but of course being as young as they are they made it look so deceiving. I think they were down for about 3 hours and then perfectly fine so we figured it was just the amount of candy and sweets and staying up late that got to them. I guess we were wrong and we were also wrong to think Dave and I would only be down for 3 hours as well! We both got no sleep all night from throwing up and what made us feel any worse (as if we could have imagined anything could at the time) Kain got sick as well and neither one of us were in much shape to help him or even be with him much. But he handled it like a champ and was fine by morning. Dave and I were not and we have no idea what we would have done without my mom coming over to help us out. She came that afternoon and stayed all night to care for the kids while Dave and I laid around on the couch. Dave's Dad dropped off gifts for the kids and although it was unfortunate we didn't get to spend time with him and Laurie that day they had taken the older two out earlier this month to dinner and a show and hopefull we will be able to catch up with them soon. We managed to get around to letting them open gifts that evening while we all watched my favorite "It's a Wonderful Life" I suppose it was a blessings since Dave was too sick to fight me on it.

The kids did not skip a beat come Christmas morning even though Santa did bringing Kain a gift he already had!

Luckily he was overwhelmed with everything else from the day to even care much

I love the way my children have learned to pose over the holidays

This one of Gage has to be my favorite pose

All in all I have to say it was such a wonderful blessed Christmas! Aside from our sickness on the final day (although there is still 4 days left of Yule) I don't think it could have been any better. Dave extended his five days off and took another down day yesterday to re-coop and we opened the last of our gifts with David saving a wonderful surprise for me. Everyone ask me all month long what it was I wanted which is always so hard for me to think of as my thoughts are always on things for the kids and I saw one necklace I was dying to have. I had suppected David would get it for me as he was asking me a lot more questions than usual about the place I saw it at so I told my mom about it but that she might not want to get it for me so she got me another beautiful one instead. But alas Christmas came and went and there was no crystal necklace like the I describe and just yesterday morning I said something to Dave about how all my gifts were so wonderful but I finally found something I really wanted and I didn't get it... only to have a mystery gift discovered under the tree with none other than my necklace inside. He is such a sweet and loving husband and there is not a day that goes by that I don't feel so lucky to have the family that I have. I love the way he loves me and have found it only gets better with each passing year. Although Dave will be working the last 4 days of Yule we plan to make the most of the rest of this beautiful year we have left!