The Holidays

Christmas Eve

Kevin and I both had to work on Christmas Eve. Daycare, however, was closed so Grandmom W (Kevin's mom) babysat Trent. My bosses graciously let us leave work 4 hours early so I went home to do some last minute baking. Kevin also got off work a little early so he brought a friend/coworker over to do some taste-testing and to hang out. After a few hours Kevin and I headed over to Grandmoms so we could see our little guy and have an early dinner. Dinner was, as always, delicious. Each of us also got a pair of PJ's from grandmom and grandpop (A Woodland family tradition).

By 6:00pm we were on the road headed to my parents house for our annual Christmas Eve gathering. In sticking with tradition my dad donned his Santa hoodie, cheap Santa beard, and Santa hat. He sat with his huge stocking at his side and one by one we sat on his lap (ok, most of us sat on the arm of the chair to spare his poor legs) and got one present. Trent, being the "most important" (aka, only child in attendance) was up first. He didn't take to Santa as well as we'd hoped he would. I'm not sure if it was because Santa was a stranger, or if Trent just tired, or a combo of the two.

One of my brothers and I both got a checkerboard set. Kevin got warm work gloves and a work hat. Unfortunately I can not recall what everyone else got that night (give me a break, it's been 1.5 weeks now...).

We headed home shortly after finishing the present portion of the evening - it had been a long day for Trent and he was pooped.

(I let my parent's take all the pictures at their house and I haven't gotten copies yet)

Christmas Day

The plan was for us to sleep until Trent woke us up and then for us to take our time and enjoy our morning together. The morning basically went as planned. We took Trent downstairs to give him his morning bottle. While he ate that, I made eggnog pancakes and scrambled eggs. Once our bellies were full we headed over to the tree. We only had 4 presents for Trent to open, but I definitely felt that 4 was enough. He took his time opening and playing with each one. Actually, he had no interest in the 4th present (who can blame him, it was a lame book). The 3 presents he did enjoy were a puzzle, a wooden thing (see pix), and a Dr. Seuss book.

A couple days before Christmas Trent made mommy and daddy presents at daycare but we weren't allowed to open them until Christmas morning. Turns out he made us ornaments! They were very cute.

After a while we realized it was getting late and we had to get a move on. We showered and got ourselves out the door and back over to Grandmom and Grandpop Ws house. There Trent received several wonderful outfits! They even got BBJ some presents!!

After spending some time with those grandparents, it was mommom and grandpal C's turn again. First things first - we ate. My mom has always been the type to make holiday dinners early - somewhere between your typical lunch and dinner times. Because of this, we purposely skipped lunch so that we'd be extra hungry for dinner! After eating it was present time. Trent received a bunch of toys and some clothes. Uncle Mike and Amy got him some fantastic snow gear!! I was looking so forward to putting Trent in his snow suit and boots the following day (since we still had so much snow on the ground) but it rained Christmas night and nonstop the next day, washing ALL of the snow away. Hopefully it snows again soon!

After another long day for Trent we headed home for bed. He slept great, as always!

New Years Eve

What were we doing at midnight? sleeping. More on New Years Eve and New Years day to come.

2009 Holiday Season

Alicia Asks: Trent was so young for the holidays last year and I'm sure you were just settling in as parents really, so what do you hope to do differently this year as far as the holidays (Christmas, thanksgiving, new years)? Traditions you hope to start? Traditions you plan to bring from your families, etc? Do you expect (anticipate) families coming to you? you going to family? etc?

Answers: This year will be similar to last year, I think. As of right now the plan is to try to spend time with both sets of (Trent's) grandparents on Thanksgiving day.

Christmas Eve is kind of up in the air right now. My parents have a tradition where we all get together on Christmas eve, so I can only assume we'll do it again this year. As far as mass or seeing my in-laws - it hasn't been discussed yet.

Christmas Day will once again consist of us spending time with each set of grandparents at some point during the day.

Really though, it's too soon to say exactly what our plans are.

A tradition we (Kevin, Trent and I) started last year and hope to continue is picking out a live Christmas tree as a family. That's probably the only tradition we started last year.

I think Kevin and/or I have made a nice breakfasts for ourselves the past few years on Christmas morning - that's something I would like for us to continue doing. Especially now that Trent eats big people foods.

We've never had any New Years Eve traditions. Sure, sometimes I'd bang pots and pans at midnight, or watch the ball drop on television, but other times I would be fast asleep. This year we will be in California. Hopefully asleep.

I really hope to start making more family traditions over the years. It's the traditions that make the holidays special and I'm very excited to see what develops.