Our Christmas tree hunt . . . and Christmas!

All wrapped into one . . .


We had a wonderful time getting our christmas tree this year. The boys were so excited so the Monday after thanksgiving we all piled into our truck in sub-zero weather and headed to our local Home Depot. I would have liked to visit a tree farm or better yet, cut down our own tree in the forest like I did as a kid, but who had time for that or wants to go traipsing through the forest with a 2 year old and a baby. So Home Depot it was. It was such a fun night. We sang Christmas carols along with the radio and looked at Christmas lights along the way. As we were approaching Home Depot Cory pulled into McDonalds and ordered 3 hot chocolates; I don't think either of us wanted the moment to end and the we sure did enjoy that! We picked out the perfect christmas tree, threw it in the back of the truck and headed home for some decorating!!

Our little Ethan loves to hang things; it doesn't matter what it is . . . sometimes we'll come up the stairs to see that he has hung hangers on all the light switches instead of going to bed like he was supposed to, so he was in heaven just hanging those ornaments on anything that had a ledge.

Briggs enjoyed putting ornaments on the tree as well. Over the course of the month our tree lost quite a few of it's needles. Was it due to lack of water? Perhaps; we only did water it the first day. Or was it because our little Ethan threw balls into the tree everyday? Or was it caused by him running to hide behind it to get away from Briggs? Or because Briggs has been pushing his large lion king car into the branches? Perhaps the constant rearranging of all the ornaments, or the wear and tear that comes with unscrewing all the light-bulbs day in and day out--who knows, but our tree, and our living room, were in sorry shape Christmas day. But it was all chalked up to the christmas spirit and we enjoyed it so much!


Christmas eve we had a nice dinner. Cory ordered BBQ ribs and baked beans from our favorite restaurant Jack Stack, in Kansas City. We had a complete candlelight dinner. That was a lot of fun. We attempted a family program that went to pots almost from the get-go. Briggs refused to do anything but cry and Ethan was going along for the ride, and since Briggs was crying Ethan wasn't willing to do anything but have me "hold him." Cory got increasingly frustrated as he was trying to head up the oppression as well as film it. We decided that it wasn't worth it, and that we would be making some changes next year.





We read the Christmas story and had the boys lay out their stockings for Santa (Cory's tradition).


They left cookies and milk and were off to bed. They didn't however fall asleep like good little boys. Briggs cried and whined for about an hour (completely unlike him). We threatened to call Santa and that upset him even more. It kind of put a damper on the excitement that had to be mustered up at that point for Mr. and Mrs. Claus to get into a "merry" mood. After vegging on the sofa for a while we decided to play a fun game that my mom made us, opened a few gifts, and then got right into building a kitchen; a toy kitchen that is. Cory did that while I stuffed stockings and put out presents; and enjoyed a few cookies with milk.

Briggs woke up in the middle of the night and said that his head hurt. Come morning we realized that he had an ear ache. Luckily we had ear drops and some meds and that kept him pretty content about half of the day. It seemed to have gotten worse as the day went on and come to find out that those wonderful numbing drops that helped out so much during the day, were put into the wrong ear; that didn't help the situation. It was kind of a long christmas for him; and for us.

But Christmas morning the boys were so excited to see what Santa brought them. They loved their toy kitchen (it has been a hit). Briggs always tells us that he is preparing our meal for tomorrow and keeping it in the kitchen. They love to play pretend. Briggs asked for a transformer and Ethan got a Boise State football uniform and he wore it the entire day. Overall, though we would have loved to have been with family over the holidays, it was so nice to be there together with our growing little family and seeing the kids come down our stairs and see what Santa had brought them. I love the holiday season! We spent much of the day just hanging out and enjoying our little ones.