Iris may be a high-speed eater, but her gift unwrapping pace was record-breaking slow-- we started to think she was unwrapping as slowly as she was on purpose to drive her brother bonkers.
Our trip to the Midwest has been a flurry of events and activity ever since we left Pittsburgh hours before the sun came up on Monday morning, starting with Mike feeling sick shortly into the drive and me getting pulled over shortly after relieving him of the driving. I only got a warning for the speeding, which I didn't even realize I was creeping up to while trying to feed a banana to Iris in the seat behind me to keep her from waking her sick dad. But the less-than-merry she-cop did send us on our way with a citation for improper child seat restraints and a burned out headlight, which we've been meaning to fix for the better part of a year (and shoot, at 8:30 on a sunny morning, I didn't even need to have the lights on). The girls had wiggled their arms up and over their harnesses, and Jack had his belt tucked behind him. We're sure as heck cracking down on them now.
Mike continued feeling better throughout the day, though I ended up driving for more than 9 hours of the 12 road hours of the trip. We pulled into Grandma and Grandpa's house around 4:30 and had a nice chunk of the day left for visiting before bedtime. The next morning, I awoke feeling nauseated and was sick with flu symptoms the rest of the morning. I guess here is as good a place as any to get sick, as I was able to get some rest for the next two days while the kids were well occupied.
Will and Ashley arrived late Wednesday night, and the kids were excited to see them in the morning and exchange gifts after breakfast. All the kids enjoyed their new puzzles, books and puppets- and Abigail her leotard and ballerina slippers, which she's been wearing every chance she's had since, including naps.
This afternoon, I showed Jack this post from the Wards, and he was inspired to make his own puppet theater in Grandma and Grandpa's basement to showcase their newly acquired performers. He made "tickets" for each of the adults and gathered us all together for the show, whose plot was just as much a mystery to the puppeteers as the audience. It was sweet though, complete with a superhero bunny and cereal character performances. And a little bathrobe-clad sweetie, who kept stealing away under the makeshift curtain.
It's unbelievable to me that we'll already be packing up to leave tomorrow (and leaving first thing the next morning). Granted, I was sleeping for a good portion of our time earlier on, and there's been a lot filling our days (and evenings after the kids go to bed playing Apples to Apples and Cranium), but these visits seem to be getting shorter and shorter. I'm sure we'll fit in another puppet show or two before we go.
The kids awoke this morning around 7:15, and they came downstairs, a flurry of wonder and excitement around 7:30, after I'd turned on the Christmas lights and gotten the cameras ready.
Mike and I were pleased to see a huge improvement from last year (we had to stop Christmas on account of ungratefulness). There were yelps of glee and faces lit with joy. And a lot of gratitude. Jack was surprised to find the milk and cookies mostly gone and a note, highlighting their generosity this Christmas (they gave some gifts to the less fortunate this year)and reminding them of the true meaning of Christmas: the birth of Jesus.
They enjoyed their gifts (all of which, I think, were their "favorite!") while I fixed eggs and bacon to accompany our cinnamon swirl bread. We sang "Happy Birthday" to Jesus and took our time with breakfast (except for Jack, who made an exception this one day of the year in hopes of moving on to opening the gifts that remained under the tree) while finishing the final reading for our Jesse tree.
I could tell this child was happy today... she rarely cooperates for me when I pull out my camera... and today, she kept the radiant smiles coming. On a side note, they wore these robes all day- during lunch, naps, dinner... almost to the neighbors' to deliver some bread. And they are wearing them now in lieu of blankets to bed.
Find the ornament! We hid the pickle ornament, as tradition, before opening gifts, and they wanted to continue the game after gift opening... and again later in the day after naps... with different (kid-friendly) ornaments.
We spent the rest of our day listening to beautiful traditional Christmas music, reading new books, coloring and stamping, making more Christmas cards (a favorite pastime of the kids lately), talking to extended family, packing, and just relaxing with our immediate family. How incredibly blessed I am by these three little people and by my truly thoughtful and loving husband.
We had a lovely, relaxing Christmas Eve at home playing with the kids, baking, napping, attending Mass and getting ready for Santa (read here).
Church was, as expected, packed to the brim with the Easter and Christmas folks. And as a consequence (of kids who aren't used to church), the screams and laughs and loud talking of children (and sometimes their parents) resounded around the church throughout the service. *Though I can't claim to have always been attentive and pious during my childhood church-going days even though we were regular attenders, especially on Christmas Eve, when my sister and I had a habit of becoming hysterical.* At the sign of peace, the woman beside us turned toward me and said, "I have to tell you... your kids are SO well behaved. I mean, they're probably the best kids in the building. They are SO good. Really." So that made me beam. For the record, she wasn't talking about the youngest Ryan, who was as squirmy as all get-out and pretty fussy toward the end of the service, which was 50% longer than usual.
