Christmas Day

 

As usual, we had a few visitors in our bed rooom bright and early in the morning.  They were ever so excited because they knew what waited for them in the living room under the tree.  Actually, they were quite surprised to find a few gifts under the tree in their room.  They were excited and wanted to open them immediately, so they did.

Next, they moved onto the living room for some more presents.  "Santa" had blocked the hallway with some streamers, so they had to break through them to get to the presents.  First, they had to check out a note from Santa thanking the boys for the cookies they made for him.  Needless to say, they were so excited to see their presents; however, they were distracted by their stockings and wanted to open those first.  Maureen convinced them to open up their big presents first and then move on.  The theme this year was Crayola, Planes, the Octonauts, and Jake & the Neverland Pirates!  Thankfully, there wasn't a visit from the Krampus aka the Grumpus (as the boys call him).

Decorating the Tree (I Would Have Called It Tree Trimming, But I Already Used The Title)*

They had been clammoring to decorate the tree since we picked it up this morning, so they were ever so excited to finally get around to it.  Actually, they were excited to see the lights on the tree.  They wanted to help put the lights on the tree, but Maureen needed to do that by herself.

Once the lights were strung, it was time to start placing the ornaments.  John decided that he was going to build a train track around the tree.  As I type this, he is still doing it.  He's asking to build the tracks into the tree, but Maureen telling him that it is too heavy.  Young Nicholas Edward has been the stalwart helper for his mother.

Not surprisingly, the boys are doing their activities in the underwear.  They have some thing against wearing pants once they get home.  Anywho, Maureen said, "Let's make sure they are wearing pants next year."  They're still placing different ornaments on the tree and asking about presents.  It's going to be 10-more days of that.  God help us!

*Yes, we did have to put the star on twice.  They each wanted to put it at the top of the tree.

Nativity Fun

When I was younger, I liked to play with my parents' Italian Nativity set.  Needless to say, there were many chips and broken figures in said set.  I even placed my Yoda action figure in the bed of hay with Jesus every Christmas.  As you can see, the apple doesn't fall too far from the tree.  As you can see, Nicholas even sings a song about little baby Jesus.   It then segues into a talk about going to Mass on Christmas Day.  I like John's comment at the end regarding Nicholas' behavior at church.

Trimming the Tree

We headed to Home Depot this morning to pick up a Christmas tree.  John was a bit upset because he wanted to go to the OSH on La Brea, but it is still under construction.  He was crying and saying that he was ready to cancel Christmas because OSH wasn't open yet.  When Maureen turned onto Santa Monica Blvd., he changed his tune because he thought we were going home.

As we get to the tree area, there were only a couple of Home Depot associates attending to it.  Thankfully, a nice young man came over and picked out a great tree.  At first, John didn't want the tree because he said it was too small.  It was still banded together.  Once our helper opened it up, he was quite happy with the size.  We were in and out in about 20-minutes.  That's the quickest time we've ever spent buying a tree.

So, we get home and place the tree in the base and Maureen starts trimming some of the lower branches to clear the base.  Guess who grabbed their own scissors and started trimming and pruning a few branches.  Yes, the boys were quite helpful at that.

One More Birthday Post

Goldie, Our Latest Family Member

Somehow, Nicholas got it into his head that we were going to buy him a Betta fish for his birthday that was orange and that he was going to name Goldie after the goldfish on Peppa Pig.  Sure enough, we gave in and picked up a fish for him.  He was so excited to see that they had an orange fish that's like John's blue fish, Blue.  We even had to pick up some orange rocks for Goldie's new bowl.

Both boys saw all sorts of pets that they want.  Maureen was squirming when John asked for a pet rat like his old class pet, Jewel.  Nicholas passed on my faux offer to get a turtle because he's happy having one in his classroom.

Bowling in Koreatown

As one of Nicholas' birthday treats, we said that we'd do anything he wanted to do.  John had all sorts of ideas about what he wanted to do, especially ice skating.  We had to break it to him that it was Nicholas' choice.  Nicholas chose miniature golf.  Sadly, we had to tell him that it was raining and that it wouldn't be too much fun to golf in the rain.  I was running out of suggestions when Maureen mentioned bowling.  Immediately, he said, "Yes, I want to go bowling."  Both have been dying to go bowling since Mother's Day when we stopped in to the Mission Bowling Alley to check it out.

Grammy even joined us for some bowling in Koreatown.  She said that she hadn't been bowling since high school which was many moons ago.  The boys enjoyed themselves quite a bit.  John and Nicholas didn't use any help at first and rolled the balls very, very, very slowly down the lanes.  The attendant was kind enough to bring us some ramps to help with it.  They really liked that as well because they got to push it down a hill.  They also loved the ball return machine and called it the bowling ball train.  Honestly, they could have watched that and been as happy as could be.  In any event, we found out that they both liked bowling and it was relatively inexpensive.

John was pushing to go to Old MacDonalds for lunch, but we thought better of that.  Grammy treated us all to Woodranch at the Farmer's Market.  As usual, Nicholas ate his bacon and french fries, but he did get a very special treat from our server.  She brought out an ice cream sundae with a candle.  He liked that quite a bit.

Friday Night at the Grove

Maureen was not able to secure tickets to Supper with Santa at the Ebell Theater, so she decided to take the boys to The Grove for dinner and a little snow fun.  The boys have been dying to see the snow at The Grove since last month and now they were going to get their chance.  As if that weren't enough, some of their school friends were going to join them for fun.

So, they headed over to the Farmer's Market for some dinner and running around the stools.  That helps to tire them out.  After dinner, the trolley was letting people off, so they jumped on board.  This was a dream come true for these two because they were out at night, they had dinner away from home, and they got to ride the trolley.  To top it all off, they got to see the really cool "snow" at The Grove.

Sadly, I was unable to attend because I had to work, but they had tons of fun and fell asleep as soon as they got home.  I'd say that was a success.

It's My Birthday, My Bu-Bu-Bu-Birthday

Nicholas woke up this morning at 6:45 and came into our room and said, "I'm four years old today!"  We had to remind him to keep his voice down because not everyone in the building needs to hear his proclaimations.  So, we stalled for a bit before we headed out to the living room to open up his presents.  He was quite excited to see his Dusty Scooter that we gave him.  He was very thankful for the Dusty books that John "gave" to him.  As you can see, there is s theme to the gifts.   He got a little upset and was quite rude to some family members who gave him a Batman toy.  Maureen was mortified.

Additionally, he gets to have anything he wants for breakfast.  Guess what he chose?  He chose ice cream with chocolate sauce.  We've asked him what he wants to do today.  He said miniature golf, but we told him it might rain.  John was pushing for ice skating, but we had to remind him that it was Nicholas' choice today.  Maureen tossed out bowling and Nicholas thought that might be fun.  He asked if people do that outside and we told him yes, but that only old men who wear white bowl outside.  We told him it's called lawn bowling or bocce ball.