One More Christmas

We went to Randy's parents' house on Sunday for one more Christmas celebration. Remember how Travis asked Santa for trucks, helicopters, and a firetruck? Well, we got him a truck and helicopter, and Me-Me and Pop obliged with the firetruck in a BIG way!

Travis opened all of his presents except for one, and Me-Me and Pop made him wait until everyone else had opened ALL of their presents before he could open his last one.

It nearly killed him waiting!

But then he saw what it was and oh my, was he excited! He said, "Santa listened to what I asked for! It's just like I wanted!" He had specified that he wanted a firetruck with a tall ladder and lights and a siren. And this one has...it...all. Yeah.

It's remote controlled and when it goes forward the sirens blare and the lights flash. Oh, and did I mention that it shoots water? Really. Me-Me and Pop keep toys at their house, and pretty soon this truck will make its way back to them. My fuse shortens by about half when sirens are the background noise.

And then when we got home we had a Toy Story moment: Travis' favorite truck up to now has been a flatbed semi tractor trailer that he received for his second Christmas. It was almost bigger than him at that point. He affectionately calls it Mack, like from the movie Cars. It has realistic steam pipes, bumpers, lots of chrome, and it has all slowly been pulled off. It's covered in stickers, and I wrote its name on a piece of paper for everyone to know and Travis taped it on with about half a roll of scotch tape, and then covered it with ANOTHER paper, so no one would see the name. (?) Anyway, definitely a favorite. Oh, and his trucks sleep. Often we have to take a bath with the bathroom door closed so we don't make too much noise and wake the trucks. So when we came home with this new truck, he had to have a place for it to sleep, and he wanted to move Mack so his new truck could take its place. I wanted to hug Mack and tell him it would be okay. Ridiculous, I know!

But seeing Travis face was priceless. My sister got a video, but the file is too large to load on blogger. Travis has seen the video about 25 times though!

Winter Swimming

Travis really wanted Uncle Jerry to watch him at swimming lessons, but they were out of session for the holidays while everyone was here, so we did the next best thing and rented a hotel room and used their swimming pool one day while everyone was here. Unfortunately Travis was a little bit sick and the water felt very cold to him so he didn't want to swim very much. He still had plenty of fun though. He asked Uncle Jerry to throw him in the air and he jumped off the edge of the pool to Jerry too.

Justin didn't mind the cold and he splashed and played and had lots of fun! Then we warmed up in the whirlpool. Both boys agreed that was the best!

My brother was in charge of the camera and I guess he thought it would be funny to take a picture of Uncle Jerry's head. Kind of sweaty! Jerry said, "Huh, so that's what it looks like up there!"

And Jerry invented a game to play with Justin since Justin isn't quite as "into" flying like Travis is. Jerry the swing set! Justin thinks this is pretty fun!

It was a double bonus for us because Randy and I spent the night at the hotel and Mireille and Jerry stayed with the kids! (Did I mention the boys were a little under the weather?! We wanted the experience to as realistic as possible!)

Christmas Fun

We had a good family Christmas his year. My mom came in early to help with cookies and other preparations, my brother drove in from Phoenix, and Mireille and Jerry came from Seattle. Plus we had Randy's parents who live in town. Christmas morning gets more difficult every year trying to get the kids to wait to open stockings and presents. Of course, it is a lot to expect given that they come from sneaky genes that have been known to sneak downstairs Christmas morning and peak at presents, and then went back to bed to wait for the official present-opening. (That would be their father!) Travis was allowed to open his stocking before the others had arrived and then when we all sat down to open stockings Travis got to open one Santa present. (Remember he asked for trucks, helicopters, and a firetruck...) So he got a truck that has a drill that can be used to take the truck apart. He really thought that was "Cool!" He managed to get that thing apart in record time!

Then we ate breakfast/brunch. I love breakfast foods, so there is always a plethora of foods in which to indulge on Christmas morning at our home. And it's kind of like my cookie fetish: never the same thing twice. I do make a slight exception at Christmas and we have some of the same foods every year, but there are always new things at Christmas. This year I think I made 4 new dishes. It's my Christmas present to myself. :) Justin was being a ham at the table so we got a few shots of his silliness.

And this is Justin before the big present-opening. I think he looks cute. Randy thinks he looks mad.

We received an e-mail a few weeks ago from my sister's mother-in-law saying that she found some John Deere tractor fabric at the store and she wanted to make some matching pants for the boys. I asked if she would have enough to make "worker" aprons for Travis' tools. She came through in a BIG way and the boys both have the cutest pants! Travis was a little more impressed than Justin. Especially when she also sent a calendar of tractors for Travis. He loves that he gets to rip off a page every day.





Justin's favorite gift might have to be a set of maracas. They taste good and they make a cool noise!

And then there is Travis' favorite gift: This has been Jerry's dream for most of this year. It might have been last Christmas that he "claimed" a bike as his gift to Travis. He researched and test drove and ordered this bike for Travis. Everything can be adjusted so this bike can grow with Travis. Jerry really did ride it around the bike shop! They ordered it and we picked it up when we were in Seattle in October. It has been in a box in our garage for 2 1/2 months. When Jerry and Mireille came into town on the red eye on Christmas Eve, the first thing he wanted to do was pull that bike out of the box and put it together. He assembled and adjusted and even took off the warning labels because they didn't look "cool". (You know, the labels that say you can die if you don't take appropriate precautions. Yada, yada...) He put a big bow on the front and covered it in a blanket in our garage until Christmas Day. Travis never even noticed because of the other big thing in our garage (my best present!) which I will tell you about later!


He did a great job riding! It took him a little bit to get the hang of it, but then he was off like a shot!

The other thing that Jerry brought was ice cream! Oh yeah! 4 gallons and 11 pints! All different too! Travis think Uncle Jerry is the best and so now when he plays ice cream man (a frequent favorite) he delivers Uncle Jerry's ice cream. We have egg nog, dulce de leche, egg nog chocolate chip, Mireille's wedded bliss, peanut butter oreo, chocolate oreo, toasted coconut, and several others. The freezer is full! We had no pie for Christmas, but we had lots of ice cream!

Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve and the last link has been removed from the month-long chain, the reindeer food has been spread (how much oatmeal can you spread on a yard before it turns into a chunky mess the next time it rains?), cookies are left for Santa (he had better be hungry!), and the stockings are hung by the chimney with care. Travis said he would sit for ONE picture by the fireplace and that's it! I am glad it turned out okay!

A Special Christmas Present

Last week in OT, Justin started working with a crayon. He knows what to do, sort of, but he mostly just taps the crayon and makes dots. Coloring is good for him to develop shoulder and arm strength. He needs to learn how hard to press on the page. And he is also learning how to color on the walls! Coloring on a piece of paper taped to the wall allows him to work different muscles than just coloring on a table. Miss Caroline started showing him what to do by doing it herself, and then she held his hand and colored, and then she let him try. So this was the progression: Her colors are in the upper right corner, then he up and down lines she did holding his hand, and then the dots are his of course, but THEN, the horizontal lines are ALL HIS! He did the three strong lines across the middle of the page. When Miss Caroline came out with this paper and showed it to me, I was so excited! Justin's first coloring page!

Work Part 2

So Travis has picked up the "work" thing too. He asked to change the air filters in our house yesterday. Apparently goggles and a flashlight are the tools necessary for such a task. Only a little dirty after the job was done. And he even threw away the old ones out in the trash. Very commendable!

Work

I am not sure if I have mentioned it, but my parents were divorced about 6 years ago after 37 years of marriage. When that happened, I really struggled with the values and qualities that I had learned from them. It took a long time for me to see any good in my upbringing. It was a challenge for me to see past the hurt and frustration and pull the nuggets that I know were always there. It took some serious prayer asking God to remind me of the good memories of growing up and not to see them all with tainted lenses.

With that in mind:

This weekend, Randy has been sick, along with both boys. We even had to miss a birthday party that Travis has been anticipating for several weeks! So I had the opportunity to serve Randy by mowing the lawn. (Where we live, we mow the lawn in December to rake the leaves.) He has been wanting to do it, but all the rain we have had has made our backyard into a mud pit. I was thinking about the day as I mowed along when I was struck by the realization that I had my parents to thank for that very moment. They had taught me to see a job that needed to be done and to be willing to do it. They taught me not to be afraid of hard or dirty work, and to work at a job until it's finished. I have been hot and filthy and very sweaty more than once doing jobs with Randy. And it has been good for us to work together, even when the jobs weren't all that enjoyable. Doing it together made it so much better! I was grateful to have a specific example of a lesson I learned being put into practice in a tangible and meaningful way. It was actually sweet to see the three sickies through the beautiful new patio doors watching Micky Mouse Christmas shows. It was cute watching Justin up on his knees with his little face pressed against the window. His smile made me smile as I worked and I was filled with joy knowing that I had an answer to prayer and a great reason to thank God as I made another pass with the lawn mower.