Christmas Recap
Here are a few photos left over from Dave’s (40th!!!) birthday. We celebrated with a dinner out at Cyclhops in Longmont the night before and had homemade spaghetti on his birthday before he opened his presents.
We had some beastly cold weather between Dave’s birthday and Christmas.
Can you believe we didn’t have our photo taken on Christmas Eve? Dave played his oboe for the 5:00 p.m. worship service, and Phoebe took part in the Christmas pageant. She was delighted to be asked to be a reader; she didn’t have to dress up in costume, and she loves to read in public. Benjamin got assigned a part, but he declined to dress up and walk to the manger with the other kids, so we just watched Phoebe. She was wonderful! She had to stand on a box at the lectern, but she spoke slowly and clearly, just as I reminded her a hundred times beforehand. (And just as my mom used to remind me!) There were a couple of tricky words that we practiced in the car on the way there, and when it was almost time for the pageant, I asked if she’d looked at them one more time. She rolled her eyes and showed me the piece of paper with her reading printed on it—she’d underlined the words, of her own initiative!
The kids and I snuck out after her reading and had a picnic dinner in the nursery before worshiping as a family at the 7:00 p.m. service. When we got home, Phoebe left cookies, milk, and carrots for Santa and the reindeer.
Christmas day itself was chilly and dreary, but we didn’t care, because we had four rounds of presents to open! Santa left a note back; I only got this fuzzy photo of it.
We had a really nice Christmas holiday. It was wonderful to have so many days in a row with nothing planned and nowhere to be. As you can imagine, we sat at one or two coffee shops every day, sometimes playing board games. We got up whenever we felt like it. Even though I kept up my exercise schedule, I turned off the alarm clock and went out whenever I got up. We made only a few plans, but we found enough to do anyway. There were toys to play with (lots of Lego fun!) and books to read. We went to the library and the playground. We spent a day with my best friend Elaina’s sister Laura and her kids, Logan and Leah, who were visiting Laura’s father-in-law in Colorado Springs. Leah is not quite a year older than Phoebe, so they like to play together, and Logan loves to hang out with Benjamin. Benjamin and Dave developed bad colds, so it was good to have some recovery time. I had a chance to cook, including making a bouche de noel that was very fussy but extraordinarily delicious. I even made meringue mushrooms to decorate it!
Dave had a show with the Flatirons Jazz Orchestra on New Year’s Eve, so the kids and I spent the evening with our good friends, the Wilensky/Berzanskis clan (Andrew, Maggie, Tilley, Whit, and Milam). The kids stayed up pretty late, but none of the three of us made it till midnight. On the last day of vacation, New Year’s Day, Dave went to work, but I took the kids to see Sing, which Phoebe and I had been eagerly awaiting.
The kids went back to school on a Wednesday and had a snow day on Thursday!
Now we’re back to the routine. Just before Christmas, I got in a minor car accident taking Benjamin to preschool (we had already dropped Phoebe off at first grade). It was icy, and I slid through an intersection, trying to stop, while another car slid into me. Benjamin and I were both fine; he was mainly annoyed that we had to stop on the way to school. However, our Subaru Legacy, Luna, was totaled, mostly due to her age (and a possible broken strut). We ended up buying a gently used Mazda CX5, which the kids and I named Cherry Blaze. We’re really enjoying “the big red car,” as Benjamin calls it. It has all sorts of fancy modern amenities and safety features.
The kids are back at school, and Benjamin has—just today—hit a milestone. He’s officially a non-napper at Take-A-Break! He hasn’t been napping on the weekends for more than a year, but he was still taking a nap at daycare. Lately, though, he’s been disturbing other kids because he won’t go to sleep, so it’s time for him to join the ranks of the big (little) kids. He’s very excited about it!
A few random photos:
