There has been heaps (notice the use of the Aussie term) of excitement over Santa at our house this year. The kids have enjoyed all the preperations: making ornaments and garlands, baking cookies and cupcakes and wrapping presents. It's been really fun to see how the anticipation has grown exponentially with two of them.
Christmas Eve this year was spent getting some of the prep work down for our Chrissy lunch feast and making cupcakes for Santa and in general staying at home. Cian's friend Reuben had some cupcakes for Cian and wanted to play at the park so there was a brief outing where we exchanged cupcakes and Reuben made Cian a card (which is unbelievably adorable). We then put on our semi-nice summer outfits and went to Christmas Eve service in a very bright and sunny 28 degrees. A warm Christmas is actually not as weird as a bright Christmas - that seems to be the jarring difference for us. We walked to church at 5:30pm and it was so bright you needed sunglasses.
Turns out taking our children to church at their "witching hour" of 5:30-6:30pm is as disasterous as it sounds. We made it to the shepherds and wise men and they could not sit still. I considered this a personal parenting fail. Keith told me that maybe my Christmas gift to myself would be to ease up a bit. He's probably right. It was the family service - no one was embarrassed about it but me. I believe that Jesus might believe in "it was the thought that counts".
We had some snacks and watched an out-loud reading of "The Polar Express" on YouTube (we couldn't bring all our books with us), set out cupcakes for Santa and took the kids up to bed. This is where the real work began and I'm sure other parents had the same experience. At least I had convinced Keith that we had to assemble the bikes earlier than Christmas Eve (which in retrospect he agreed was a really good idea). We set up the presents and set up the projector for the morning and put wrapping paper with messages over Cian and Emily's "doors" (I use quotations here because Cian sleeps in a fort in the open study so I had to make-shift a door for him. We watched "The Family Man" and then went to bed ourselves.
We went to bed a little late (ie 1am) so it stands to reason that one of the children would wake up in the middle of the night. This is a consistent phenomenon and I'm not sure why I never learn. This time it was Cian. I woke up and heard him crying and realized that, of course, he hadn't come to our room like he usually does because he couldn't get out of his bed; I had gift wrapped him into it. He wasn't fully awake but I sprang from my bed to see what was the matter. He wanted some water and wanted me to lie down with him because he was sick. I ended up spending the remaining 4-5 hours of that night on a mattress in a fort. I then crept out of his bed before he woke up. When the kids did wake up they had a great time ripping off the gift wrap from their doorways before going downstairs. The kids came downstairs to a winter wonderland of presents and larger than life falling snow on the projector behind the tree. I had been dreaming about doing this for quite some time and it was so awesome to see it work so well. Both kids ran to the screen and hugged it and yelled "SNOW!!!!" It was perfect.
The kids opened their presents under the tree and they have similar things they like so they were both quite interested in the other's presents. This could have been worse than it was - we are pretty lucky that they play so well together. The Ninja Turtle pillow pet was a huge hit and Emily loved her doll - both were big fans of their platypuses. After all the presents were opened we reminded them there was gift wrap across the door to the garage and they tore it down and found their bikes. Where we live now is the perfect place for the kids to learn how to ride bikes because the bike path is outside our kitchen window and it's mostly flat for long stretches so we decided to get them bikes for Christmas so they could learn. Kids here learn how to bike very early because of how nice the weather is and since most of our year is winter in Winnipeg this seemed like a perfect opportunity. All in all, our little Christmas was a big success.
After our breakfast of "skinny pancakes" (aka crepes) and raspberry sauce and cream we were trying to get ready for the Winters were coming. Keith laughed every time I said that because supposedly it's a Game of Thrones joke. We did not budget enough time to get ready and they arrived to mass chaos. That was probably good cause I think (more like I hope) they then felt comfortable and welcome right away. The kitchen had been clean but after a morning of crepes and raspberry sauce that was a distant memory. Keith was still in the shower when they got here and although Brent would have been used to the Morris chaos from a lifetime of it - Cassie was a particularly good sport. We had an afternoon and evening of great craic (that's conversation for the non-Irish), delicious food and beautiful champagne/white wine/red wine all paired to the food courtesy of the Winters. Interesting note it took us 3 tries to make the pavlova even after I had done a practice run a few days ago with no problems. Turns out that you cannot make pavlova in a metal bowl - there's a reaction that makes it impossible - so that's the secret: plastic bowl. Cassie brought stuff for the kids and both kids were all over Brent and Cassie (no shyness over here). It was an excellent Christmas day. The kids were exhausted by the end and went to bed without a fuss.
Today (Boxing Day here/Christmas Day in Canada) Cian woke up and promptly threw up. I guess whatever had been brewing over the last couple days came to a head. He then decided to chug some milk and, you guessed it, threw up again. We tried to keep it low-key in the morning since he was barfing but our little guy doesn't seem to be troubled by illness that much - he's his usual very active self. After yesterday where we spent the day indoors (to beat the 31 degree heat) he was more than ready to go outside. He wanted to ride Emily's bike and was throwing a bit of a fit that he had to use his until he got it on the path. It took him about 2 seconds to remember how to pedal a bike and he was off. His face beamed and it was so cute to watch. Long gone were the memories of his temper tantrum that he couldn't ride Emily's bike because she was way slower than him on his cool "Jake and the Neverland Pirates" bike. We thought we would just go for a quick trip down the path but Cian wanted to go see Henry (the swan) and despite the mid-trip rain he was determined. He even did the big hill up and down to the bridge over the river. At one point he got off his bike to examine the mechanics of his front hand brake (something my engineer father is sure to be proud of). It was great to see his immediate skills at biking. Emily had a bit of a tougher time of it and was far more interested in strapping herself in and out of the bike and/or pushing her own bike from behind. She is currently having a nap and we have yet to see what the rest of Boxing Day holds in store for us. All in all, we have had a wonderful Chrissy adventure in Aus. Wishing our family and friends back home and around the world a very Happy Holidays!
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