Christmas 2016

We've been thoroughly enjoying winter break thus far, just taking it easy. We've made a few treats, but not many, and have done some cleaning of the house, but not all that should be done. We got our tree on the 11th, when I was sick. Ryan and Gareth went to pick it out. Then we got it in the stand and went through our annual ritual of freeing the branches.

Once I was done with finals we put on the lights and then added ornaments a couple days after that. 

The boys were very eager to take part in that. Oh, and apparently we managed to get Mal dressed that day. Good job, us!

We've done minimal baking thus far. Gareth and Mal put together the dough for gingerbread cookies and then I made them up a couple days later. Mal and I made cranberry-macadamia bars while Ryan and Gareth were out seeing Rogue One. Oh, and the boys got haircuts. Gareth's wasn't very drastic, just trimming around the ears. But Mal had several inches cut off since he hasn't had a cut in a couple years.

We had our usual big Christmas Eve dinner and then watched A Christmas Carol while drinking hot chocolate. After the kids were in bed we put together stockings up in our room and then once we figured Gareth was asleep we put out all the presents. The past couple years we've been good about wrapping presents as they come, which I've been very grateful for come Christmas Eve.

The boys got up around 8 Christmas morning. Gareth helped Mal get dressed and then they hung out in our room while Ryan and I got ready. By that time they were very eager to head downstairs. We opened stockings and a couple presents then had our traditional breakfast.

Then we returned to present opening. Mal was very excited by the dinosaur he received from his Grandma and Grandpa. "They got it at a store!!!" were the first words out of his mouth.

Ryan acted as the present-giver, carefully balancing how many each child had opened so that things were kept equitable.

He opened some of the family gifts, including this one for which I'm excited. We got a companion game from my sister.

Ryan got some house slippers. Almost every review said they run small, but he decided this morning that the size 14 was too large, so we'll take those back and try out the 13.

Gareth was very excited to get a couple more Perplexus puzzles.

Ryan stole it and managed to get to 4 or 5 (out of 125) before falling off the track. I made it to 2.

So that was the holiday. Nice and relaxing and enjoyed greatly by the kids.