Today we went to our fourth (I think) annual Santa play date at the Smith Family's home. We are so grateful to Sarah and Harrison for keep this tradition and giving us an opportunity to spend time with good friends that Meo and Link have known since they were infants.
Both our boys really enjoyed playing with friends today. Meo probably wore every costume in the costume box at some point and played a lot of pretend with his friends. Link was really into play cars and trains .
Every year we have done this handprint craft and it's fun to look at them all together as they grow older and bigger.
It is nice seeing how patient and kind the big kids have grown to be with the younger siblings.
The kids were so excited when Santa appeared!
He read them a Christmas story.
Then everyone got a chance to go meet Santa.
photo credit: Laren
Robbie got captured and put in jail quite a bit.
Laren got taken out too.
Thank you again to the Smith family for a fun morning, and to all the friends we got to spend time and play with today.
This year, I made kindness elves for the boys. I saw the idea a couple years ago but never got around to making them in time, as holidays seem to spring upon us. I wasn't overly bothered though because I thought they were too young to really appreciate it. But this year I planned ahead of time and was ready. Everyday the elves wrote a note to the boys' giving them a suggestion of something kind that they could do that that day starting December 1 all the way through to Christmas. It was my hope that this would draw their attention away from the obsessing about what gifts they will get and the commercialization aspects of the holiday and help them to realize the beauty of kindness and family that tend to go along naturally with the holiday season. And you know what? I think it worked, at least to some degree, with Meo. There were many times throughout the month where Meo was seen pausing to think about his actions, then he would report to me about how he was going to do one thing but decided to do a more kind thing instead. Of course Meo was still very excited about presents at Christmas time and hoped that each one under the tree was his, but I feel like leading up to the day he was great about not acting greedy and during the holiday it was a gracious and kind gift receiver. Plus it felt great to be making an effort to do do kind things everyday for our family, friends and community. It will certainly be a tradition we continue as it was well worth the effort.
I made a photo book for the boys to look back at and remember all the kind things we did. Hopefully it will inspire them (and all of us) to be kind all year long.
I haven't been as great about posting for the last few months. That is because my ten year old computer died and the one I was temporarily using used Linux and wasn't compatible with the software I normally edit and organize all my photos in...and also would randomly shut off frequently. BUT, I have a brand new computer now that Robbie built for me and it is amazing. So no more excuses. Undoubtedly the perfectionist in me will go back and sort through photos and squeeze in some missing posts...if I can make the time. But at least now I can keep up with the present.
We had a great Christmas this year, although it felt kind of strange. We did all the right things...decorated, listened to Christmas music, baked gingerbread cookies, went to Christmas parties, etc. But I think the unusually warm weather (It hasn't snowed even once yet!), and the fact the Robbie doesn't get to take any time off during the holiday season as it is their busiest time of year, kind of threw things off. But Christmas has come and gone and it was still wonderful. Here are some photos some our holiday. Santa Play Date at the Smith's
This play date is an annual tradition that our friends generously put on each year. Her house was filled up the brim with little kids, laughter, yummy snacks, arts and crafts, and good conversations between friends. This group of mamas have known each other for four years now since we all met each other at a breastfeeding support group, and we are blessed to have continued to grow, learn, and play together all these years. What a great way to celebrate the end of another year of friendship!
Mattimeo did not care for meeting Santa at all, but Link didn't mind. Especially when Santa gave him a present. Our little sweet heart said thank you and tried to give it back to Santa as a gift.
Once the Santa part was done though, Meo had a blast playing with his friends. He spent a lot of time playing with his gal pal Leela, and they were joined with others when they began to have pirate adventures.
Link spent most of 2 hours playing trains. And then was very upset when it was time to stop playing trains and go home.
The cutest was when Meo and Leela gave big hugs goodbye. What a fun day we all had! Thank you Sarah!
Friendsgiving
Our little gang of friends (that we don't get to see very often!) was able to all get together for some conversation, games, and gift swapping. I am so thankful for Robbie's parents agreeing to watch the boys so that we could go alone and give our friends our undivided attention. It was a fun and much needed afternoon with peers. One funny part of the evening is when someone opened up a gift and it was a cutting board and we all got SUPER excited then laughed because when did we get so old that we are excited about cutting board?! You have to keep in mind that most of us were teenagers and went to high/school together or met in college. Those were very different times, and we have come a long way. Sort of :).
Gingerbread Cookie Decorating Play Date
We had some friends coming over to our house for a play date, and the night before I decided to bake a batch of gingerbread cookies for the older siblings to decorate. All of us have two children...one preschooler and one toddler/infant...so sometimes its nice to have guided activities for the big kids so everyone doesn't get too crazy and/or overwhelmed from all the excitement. So we decorated cookies...and did some playing too of course.
Meo and his friend Penny did a great job making the icing together.
After the sugar intake, I sent everyone outside to play and take a walk in the forest.
It was a fun morning and we enjoyed our tasty treats all week long!
Gosselin Christmas Party
Our annual Gosselin side of the family party was held at a hall in Kennebunk. It was an emotional one with the loss of Pepere earlier this year, but it also made the familial bond and the importance of our connection feel more vital I think. The children were wild, and it is fun to see them all play together and have such a fun time. It feels like not that long ago it was our generation running around and playing together.
Instead of a gift swap this year we played a few rounds of BINGO. My boys were all about helping the grown ups out with choosing numbers.
We ended the afternoon with Christmas carols. I am so grateful that this side of the family is very musical and that the boys are able to experience the joy of caroling with family. We brought some percussion instruments for the kids to play along, and it was so sweet to see our niece Cheyanne dance around and make music.
Meo played Toppling Tower a couple times with Chris and Audrey; he loved that.
The Nutcracker Ballet
Robbie worked from home so that he could hang out with Link while I took Meo to his first ballet. We were able to get discounted tickets with a large group of homeschoolers (I think there were 150 tickets from our group alone) for a matinee showing. The music and dancing was beautiful! And while Meo really enjoyed it and thought it was great to watch, he was pretty tired by the second half and wanted to go home. I convinced him that we should stay and watch the rest and he politely agreed, but soon fell asleep resting against my shoulder.
Rocray Christmas Eve Party
We had our annual Christmas Eve party at my parents house with some of our Aunts and Uncles, cousins, and Pepere. It was nice to see everyone, and the kids were all cute and being sports despite it being a difficult time of day for them to be out and about. We had a really lovely night and are grateful for the gifts the boys were given and yummy food shared.
Christmas Eve
Robbie and I still had presents to wrap and get under the tree, so after giving the boys's a bath and having Meo leave cookies and a note for Santa, we were up until Midnight making our final preparations.
We also didn't get enough wrapping paper so we had to resort to cutting up paper bags...of which we had just barely enough to finish!
Christmas Morning
I love seeing our families on Christmas, and I am thankful that they all live close enough that we see them all and still have a leisurely Christmas morning at home. We had a wonderful time opening stockings filled up with things like toy birds and Star Wars spacecrafts. The kitties get stockings too, and nothing is cuter than seeing our 10 year old Theta turn back into a kitten when he bats his favorite Christmas mice around the house. We went outside to give the birds a special Christmas treat. Then we opened up our presents under the tree.
This year the boys got A LOT of books. I had gotten a bunch of free and discounted book from my work through Usborne publishing, but I also got them some other books that I though would either be really great for our homeschooling needs or for their interests at the moment.
Link got a colorful abacus, some beautiful castle blocks, and some Wild Kratts toys.
Robbie got a raincoat, some LLBean fleece pajamas, a flash figurine and a board game.
Meo got some really great new snowshoes (that hopefully we will get to try out soon...come on snow!), Star Wars ships, Wild Kratt toys, and pink bunny slippers (he picked out).
Books about stars that will go nicely with the telescope Memere and Pepere got him
Meo was really excited about his book about volcanoes and the volcano model it came with.
The boys also got some practical things...only a handful of which we wrapped since we had a bit of a paper situation. These included some beatiful child-sized flatware, small durable drinking glasses (they always want to drink from our glasses instead of their little cups so we got them proper glasses for their small hands), a glass pitcher, a little vegetable chopper, and some homeschooling stuff like rock crayons, learning pencils, pouring vessels and trays.
My Christmas gift this year was a new computer and some socks (darn tough). This computer is super fast, great for graphic editing and game playing. Robbie built it himself with our friend Joe. My sister-in-law chipped in towards buying the parts for me. And our friend Gib painted one of my favorite pieces right onto the tower. I was so surprised and I am very, very, VERY Grateful! I love it! What a wonderful gift!
One of the things I really loved about this Christmas is that I had been worried the boys would be disappointed that they got a lot of books. But every-time we opened a book, they were super excited and wanted to read them right away. I am happy that they are already such little bookworms!
I think the gift I was most excited to give them was their Wild Kratt creature power suits. I made these out of flannel and an lot of time and love. They are durable and fit them wonderfully. And best of all, the boys loved them. Right away they put on their suits and started creature adventuring. There is not much better than seeing something you poured your time and heart into making being loved and played with.
Christmas with my family
We had Christmas brunch at my parents house complete with my favorite meal of quiche, fruit salad, cheese, cinnamon rolls and lots of other yummy things.
The children were very excited and a tad crazy...particularly Mr. Linky-loo. But we had a lot a fun nonetheless and were able to enjoy present opening with only a little bit of tears.
We received some incredible gifts this year from my parents and siblings. Robbie was super excited about his ax for splitting firewood and a much needed cordless drill (both of which he used today).
Meo's big gifts were a telescope and a Tortuga (from Wild Kratts). He played Tortuga all day today, and that telescope will give us countless nights of wonderful night sky gazing as a family.
I thought it was so cute that midway through present opening, Meo decided to kick back and "read" through one of his new Wild Kratt books.
Link has started to love playing pretend, and enjoyed pretending to drive Chris Kratt around in his Createrra and making him talk. When Link pretends he usually spits out long monologues that include a combination of understandable words and babble with a lot of feeling. It's pretty adorable.
This year we got Bryce and Cheyanne super hero presents. Bryce got the Flash and a Flash Book. And Cheyanne got books and toys about Cat Woman and Wonderwoman.
We are just beyond thankful for my family for all their thoughtful presents. We got a lot of stuff that we really needed and/or had been wanting for a long time and feel properly spoiled. The boys had a lot of fun playing Donkey Kong on the Wii-U today, I was over-excited to hang up my new beautiful bird feeder, and I can not wait to make time to sit down and read all the fantastic books that are patiently waiting for me. Link played with his new train set all day long...he is obsessed. We all are very happy and also feeling quite spoiled. Thank you.
Robinson Christmas dinner
In the evening we ended our Christmas by visiting with Robbie's family. My sister-in-law Jess has become quite the chef and we enjoyed a delicious and leisurely vegetarian meal while the boys got in a nap. It was so yummy, and I can't remember the last time I was able to enjoy a meal so peacefully without people rubbing food all over the table or tapping forks against their classes, etc.
After dinner we all opened up our presents to each other. Link opened up a firetruck train as his first present and then was gone to the world. He was completely in love and left us all for the land of make-believe.
The boys got some really cool dinosaur stuff from Auntie Jess...a storybook collection, and unique set of cutouts to design scenes and act out stories. They both loves storied, dinosaurs, and pretend so they will get a lot of joy from these gifts.
When I asked Meo was his favorite Christmas present was this year he said it was the hummingbird he named "Flash" from Grandma and Grandpa. He is in love and slept with it last night and again tonight (with his friend the downy woodpecker).
Again, we are so very grateful to all the Robinson's and their wonderful, thoughtful gifts to us. Robbie was already blasting his new speakers in the kitchen while he excitedly declaring that the solar power was working and they were self charging. He's also been sipping from his fancy new water bottle all day. I am excited to hang up my affirmation flags in my yoga nook and read some good books. And Robbie and I can't wait until we can go out to eat with our Portland Dine-Around Club Membership to take advantage of all the wonderful restaurants in Portland (and also the opportunity to have Grandma and Grandpa babysit!). Thank you all so much!
After presents we enjoyed a couple rounds of a fun game called "Sushi Go".
The boys visited us periodically, but most of the time they played with Grandpa and/or watched him play video games.
Here is Link visiting us during one of our games:
Photo by Meo
I love the Robinsons so much and am so glad that I get to be part of their family. They are truly wonderful people.
Post Christmas
Today was a day for resting, enjoying time at home together as a family, and playing with our new toys.
I am truly grateful that we have been able to spend our holidays with family and make it something special and memorable for the boys. There was so much excitement, laughter and love shared and so many sweet memories made. Love you all.
