The Most Wonderful Week of the Year

This is the best week of the entire year.  Seven straight days of empty white boxes on the calendar.  Bliss.  I love this week.   And, we are officially done with all things Christmas - everything was packed up yesterday (don't hate me).  I want to get back to all things homeschool next week with a serious bang.

There are numerous things to celebrate this week...

• no schoolwork, apart from reading
• a fridge full of leftovers
• tons of cookies!!!!
• there are several family games to play and puzzles to put together
• we can get caught up on chores around the house w/o guilt
• no karate lessons to drive to
• the upcoming new year creates the perfect atmosphere to sort, donate and pitch
• I get to shred all of my documents from 2004.  Hallelujah!

Since Dean is home all this week, we have three different major projects in the works.  Finish clearing out the basement (we are a third of the way there), move the entire playroom to the basement, and move the office to what was the playroom and will now be the official school room.  I.  can't.  wait.  I have wanted this for sooooo long.  I am sad that the kids will be playing in the basement, so I don't get to hear the sounds of play in the adjoining room as I am making dinner or whatnot, but I also don't have to hear the constant fighting over toys.  I don't have to deal with the constant mess of toys strewn EVERYWHERE!  The last straw came a few weeks ago when I came down the stairs during the night, stepped on a sharp piece of Lego and went down.  I was done - the toys were going to move come hell or high water.  I do have several concerns about how to make this work. I worry about supervision.  I will have to move the baby monitor around on a daily basis, and rotate out Jordan and Rylan as we move through our lessons - which might actually be a good thing because then I can work with them one on one.  We have a big gigantic behemoth T.V. down there.  We bolted that to the wall on Monday, so I feel much better about that.  Now all I have to worry about is the china cabinet...

I wanted to get a lot of posts done this week because my mental queue is getting out of control, but the work I described above is pulling rank.  I didn't even get to post about our actual Christmas, so here it goes...It was very nice.   We had dinner at my mom's on the 23rd, and opened presents.  We went to my brother and SIL's for the large family gathering on the morning of the 24th for a brunch.  That was awesome.  I highly recommend trying that instead of a large heavy evening holiday meal.  The kids got to play out in the snow, the adults weren't stressed about how late it was getting and the kids were in fine shape.  I'm all in favor of morning things - then it doesn't interfere with naptime. 

We brought my dad home with us that afternoon and he stayed through the evening.  We got a pizza (it was too late to start the crockpot meal I had been planning to making), and had a quick dinner, then it was on to baking and frosting sugar cookies for Santa.  We hurried down to church and enjoyed a gorgeous candle light service.  Then we dropped of dad at his house, went home and put the kids to bed, and the stayed up until 3 am wrapping presents.  Good times. 

I picked dad up at 8 am, brought him home and then the kids came down and the present fest began.  We had a wonderful, low-key day.  A lazy breakfast of strawberry coffee cake, bacon and eggs, and then lots and lots of play.  My dad and I made stuffing and got the turkey into the roaster, and then we played a new game that the Oklahoma grandparents gave us.  Ever played Qwirkle?  It is awesome!! My stepmom joined us about dinner time, and we had a lovely Christmas meal of turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, veggies and cherry pie.

Loved spending some time with my dad.  We haven't seen him since before Thanksgiving.  We both arrived home sicker than sick from Thanksgiving vacations, and then the whole Chicken Pox debacle - he's another family member that can not afford to get Shingles.  It was really nice to have him here, and he loved the chance to do some baking with Rylan.

Here are some pics...

A few thoughts...

I tried to talk Santa out of it, but he insisted on bringing ice skates to Rylan.  So now we have the pleasure of figuring out how to work in skating, ballet and tap lessons.  Wow.

Rylan can pack a mean snowball.

The Firefly is an awesome toy to use in the dark - so cool.

Opening presents one-handed is difficult...especially when you can't put down the cookie.

Owen eats, sleeps, and breathes all things Lightening McQueen.

Sparring gear is expensive.

Rylan's dollhouse family can now go on holiday in a cool camper van or go camping in the wilderness.

We've watched Cars2 five times in the past 72 hours.  It's still good.

Jordan got 2 new Nintendo 3DS games.  We also found out that Jordan has frequently been getting up in the middle of the night to play... even more disturbing is that it was online with other people.   All handheld gaming devices are now under lock and key.



It was a lovely holiday and I am thankful for all of the wonderful gifts that our family received.  It was so nice to visit with family that we haven't seen in awhile - it's great that most of our kids are at an age now that they can run around and play with their cousins without constant supervision.  I also felt the painful absence of my grandmothers.  We spoke of memories, fixed some of their trademark recipes, and set the table with their holiday finest.

I'll leave you with my grandma Betty's mealtime blessing....

Be present at our table Lord,

Be here and everywhere adored.

These mercies bless

and grant that we,

May feast and fellowship with thee.

Amen.