Our Happy Holiday.

This is the first year that I have celebrated Christmas in our own home. I'm serious. You see, when I was little, we traveled to Iowa every year to spend Christmas at my grandma's house. When we had Elisabeth, Evan and I still lived in my parents' house, and we switched every year between our parents as to whose house we'd wake up in. When we (FINALLY) moved to DeKalb, we still came to Pekin for Christmas. So, this is the first year that I have woken up in my own home with my family for Christmas. It was nice. I liked it. We stayed in our pajamas until well past noon. And even though we missed our families immensely (because we did), I really enjoyed spending Christmas in our home.

We went to the Christmas Eve service at the chapel on base. We weren't too sure how Julia'd handle having to sit through a full service, but she totally surprised us. (Plus, I had drinks and cookies to keep her quiet)
She loved the carols.



Elisabeth's favorite part of the Christmas Eve service.

Julia kept saying "hot" and trying to blow my candle out.

The girls came home and put on their new Christmas Eve pajamas. Elisabeth picked out cookies for Santa and poured his eggnog. I got this beautiful picture of them...

and then Julia bawled her little baby eyes out when she realized that she wouldn't be able to eat Santa's cookies. Not happy.

Here's how Santa displayed his loot. I always try to get a picture the night we lay it out, because otherwise I am not functioning well enough in the morning to get a picture before they destroy the presentation.

And here's Santa's note. He always leaves a note thanking the girls for the cookies. He's so polite.



Elisabeth was up and ready at 6:50. We voted to not wake Julia up (cause, seriously, who does that benefit?!) and let Elisabeth see what Santa left her first. She was ecstatic for her Wii. And she loved her stocking stuffers.

We also let her open one gift while we waited for Julia. Elisabeth had been eyeballing a large gift at the front of the tree for over a week. She was constantly guessing what it was we'd gotten her. She'd guess Barbie stuff or a game or whatnot. She was wrong. Cause it was...

Rollerblades!!! She's been asking for a pair for years. Now that she can ride a two wheeler, we felt she might be able to handle rollerblades.

Look at how sk8ter-y she looks!

She wore her rollerblades while she Wii-ed and such, until she ran over my toe and was forced to take them off.

Julia finally woke up. See her longingly looking at her Santa gifts while she gets her pants changed? That's what happens when you crap your pants every morning. You have to wait to open your Christmas presents. Tsk tsk, baby.

We finally let her up and she loved her stuff. Santa even found her a replacement soft baby like the one she used to have when we lived in Pekin but lost on our move to Colorado. He's such a thinker, that Santa!

Roosevelt was thoroughly enjoying the mess we were making.

Elisabeth insisted that Julia open this present next. Both girls have been trying to either open it or guess what was inside. It was to Julia from my parents.

It was a vacuum cleaner!!! Julia giggled when she saw it and (thank the lord) it was easy to get out of the packaging. She immediately started vacuuming the rug just like her daddy.

We finished opening our presents and oohing and ahhing over everything we received.





And then Julia freaked out at the mess and went to the pantry to retrieve the big broom and tried to sweep up the mess. She can't handle a wrapping paper filled living room.

The girls spent the rest of the day playing while I cooked our Traditional English Christmas Dinner. They especially loved the tent we'd gotten Julia.


We ate our meal.

And then the girls took a bath with their new present from Nina and Papa--dissolving color tablets that change the bathwater colors. They were a big hit.


We called our parents and even Skyped them for a bit throughout the day. We are very blessed to have such thoughtful friends and family whom we truly did miss seeing yesterday. I hope you all had as awesome of a Christmas as we did!!!!

Have a Holly, Jolly Christmas!

Merry Christmas from Julia!

(I lied. That's not Julia. That's my mother-in-law from 1955. But it totally looks like Julia, right?!)

Happy Holidays from Elisabeth when she was three!



Hope Santa treated you well!! From Julia and Elisabeth (whom Santa treated very well!)

Our Gingerbread House

Finally, I am showing off our gingerbread house!

No, this is not it. This is Kyle and Evan circa 1989ish. They are posing next to the gingerbread house that Jana had made of the house they live in. Not only is it freaking fabulous, but look at how much Julia looks like Evan!!!!

Evan has been helping his mom make gingerbread house since he was Julia's age. He's helped her bake, cut, ice and decorate. So, when it occurred to us that we'd have to make our own this year, Evan wasn't worried at all. He's old hat when it comes to gingerbread construction. That's why I keep him around, people.


Okay, now on to our house this year, first I want to show you this picture.

This is a picture of Evan's grandpa in front of the family's grocery store around 1941. It's a well known picture in the family and I stinking love it since it has Grandpa in his Army uniform. We decided that this was the house we wanted to make as a gingerbread house after I found some plans for a country store online. We modified the plans (and by we, I mean Evan) and started baking the gingerbread.

First we started by putting the sides of the house together. (This picture courtesy of Miss Elisabeth)

Evan did most of the constructing. I was very frustrated with this part, but he didn't mind it at all, due to the years of expertise.


My little Star Wars helper. She'll be able to build her own three dimensional houses by like next year.

Evan is now constructing the posts to hold the porch roof up. It was his idea. I didn't even think about that. I either would have let the roof fall or not put one up. I'm going to keep him. I like him.


We let the sides dry overnight, and then Evan started putting the roof on. I took pictures and yapped his ears off. I was super helpful.



The posts. Okay, see how important they are? Evan is a smarty pants.



Here's where I become important!!! I am icing the roof so that I can start decorating the house. This is not Evan's part. He just eats candy and bugs me.


I decided to crush candy canes and use them as my roof decoration. Elisabeth helped me sprinkle them on. She also requested a gingerbread girl be next to the stack of fire wood so it'd look like she needed some for the fire inside.



And here's Gingerbread Grandpa. Sitting on the front porch just like in the original picture.


We were very pleased with our first house. We decided that as long as we make them together as a team we will continue to make them since the parts I hate he doesn't mind doing and vice versa.

It's all about compromise. We will stay married forever because we compromise on gingerbread house construction.

Surprise!!!

We had a surprise for Elisabeth. A kind of early Christmas present. Last night, Evan went to go pick it up.
This was Elisabeth's face when she saw what it was. She was beyond surprised.

For you see, Evan had gone to the airport to pick up his mom.

She'd decided to come visit us before Christmas. She will staying with us until Christmas Eve morning. Unfortunately, Keith could not make it.

Julia was asleep last night when Jana got in, so she was surprised this morning. Her face was not exactly happy, because she's a baby Scrooge, but she definitely warmed up to her Nina in no time flat.

Oh, and her are her baby toenails that I painted and that she cried about. Such a baby.