Christmas 2010

Christmas Eve was spent at home with my babies. I cooked, cleaned, and played. Tralee helped me make a birthday cake for Jesus, and we ate a piece for dessert after dinner. We even lit some candles and sang Happy Birthday to our Elder Brother. The kids were bathed, we watched some Christmas movies, and we spent a cozy night together waiting for Santa to come AND for Daddy to come home. We had a long day of prep and play, and before I knew it, it was time for sugar plums to dance in my children's heads, so I put them to bed and waited for Santa to come. Before tucking them in we played with our nativity and I told them the story of Jesus' birth, and reminded them once more why we celebrate Christmas. Even with all the excitement, it didn't take long for my babes to drift into their dreams. I promptly went downstairs and finished preparing for Santa's arrival.

Here's what the living room looked like after Santa's visit:

I went to bed late, and couldn't really fall asleep cause I was so excited for Jim to come home! I was also excited for Christmas to come!!

Jim finally made it home in the middle of the night and he and I spent a few hours laughing, talking, and wondering what the babies would think when they saw Jim AND when they remembered it was Christmas. Jim and I finally got a few winks when Tralee wandered into our bedroom (like she does most mornings), climbed into our bed, rolled over and saw Jim, and instantly became glued to him. She kept saying, "Oh!!!" She couldn't believe her eyes. Hunter was excited too when he woke up and noticed Daddy was home, but not as much as Tralee. Tralee's a little Daddy's girl. After all the excitement of having Jim home wore off a bit we asked, "Tralee and Hunter, do you want to see if Santa came?" That brought a whole new level of wonder, so off we went to see if we were good little boys and girls.

The consensus was we were all on the nice list. Tralee had been asking for a "Puffing Pig" (among other things) for weeks. Every time we talked about Santa, or saw Santa, she mentioned the Puffing Pig game. She even told her friends, "Santa's going to bring me a puffing pig." Sure enough, the game (which is really called Pop the Pig) was waiting for Tralee with a letter from Santa. Tralee couldn't believe her eyes, and as she crept up to it a breathless "Whoa!" escaped her lips. Jim and I started playing a game of Pop the Pig with Tralee right away, and became a bit confused when Tralee ran away scared. We figured out she thought the pig was REALLY going to explode and its insides were going to get everywhere. We showed her this wasn't the case, and she warmed up to it again. Since Christmas morning I think we've playing Pop the Pig about a million times.
Hunter on the other hand, wasn't all that impressed with all the gifts. Probably because they just looked like red and green boxes and not toys. The gift he did like right away was a ball that was wrapped up. Hunter loves balls, and before this ball was even unwrapped, Hunter was rolling it around. Imagine his joy when he realized, he didn't have to play with it wrapped up in silly Christmas wrapping paper. Other than that, he wasn't very interested in unwrapping gifts. Tralee was quite the opposite, so we let her help Hunter with his. She frantically unwrapped each gift and then exclaimed, "Daddy! Daddy! Daddy! Look! Look! Look!" It was really cute.

Tralee even helped Corky with her stocking.

Candy for breakfast? Yes, please.

Tralee got some princess shoes. As soon as she unwrapped them she ran up to her room and put on a dress. I guess princess shoes and pj's don't go together.

Hunter's favorite present was this ball game thing. He kept going, "Whoa!!!" and then cracking up as each ball popped out. Tralee also had fun playing with it.

And. . . . here's the aftermath:

We didn't get it cleaned up until the next day. In fact, later that day Jim and I let the kids play with all their new toys while we went and took a nap in our new bed we got each other for Christmas. But, before that we ate Christmas brunch.

When I grew up in Wisconsin, where all my family is from, our Christmas tradition was eating Christmas brunch at Nana's house. It's still a tradition there, but since I can't be there, I fix the same Christmas brunch for my family:

Frozen Peaches

Creme filled crepes with raspberry sauce

Ham

Quiche Lorraine

Kielbasa

Cherry Kringle

Cranberry bread

and give or take a few more menu items

It's just not Christmas without crepes, quiche, and all the rest.

We had a wonderful Christmas together as a family. We all spent the day in our pajamas (except Tralee who probably changed outfits five or six times), we watched Christmas movies snuggled up together, played games together, ate yummy food, played pretend (Tralee got a princess castle and she and I spent a few hours playing pretend), we called and talked to family, took naps, ate more yummy food, and just enjoyed each other's company. It was perfect!

I hope that everyone else had a wonderful holiday as well.

Christmas Eve Eve

Two nights before Christmas Audie, myself, and all of our kiddos went to the Idaho Botanical Gardens to see their display of Christmas lights. The husbands were still in Oregon working, so this was our last hooray as single moms before Christmas. Despite the chilly weather, we had a blast.Hunter was fine as long as we kept walking. He didn't like it when we stopped. The only time he behaved when we were standing still was when we were in the tent that was handing out hot chocolate and cookies. He was fine just sitting there with a cookie in his mouth and hot cocoa to sip on.
The picture below looks like the girls are singing Christmas carols. They're not, but let's just pretend they are. It looks cuter that way.

More lights.

You may or may not believe this, but one of Santa's reindeer was there! The kids got to pet him! I think it was Prancer. It could have been Dancer. . . I forget.

Jovie, Audie, and Oaks pictured below.

Next picture is Hunter, Oakley, Tralee, me, and Jovie. See that white spot in the corner? That's Audie's glove. So, I guess we're ALL in this picture.

We had a great night, but Tralee was SOOOOOO overtired she fell asleep in two seconds when we were driving home.

Next up? CHRISTMAS!!!!!

Night Out

The kids and I met up the the other Jacobs clan at the mall on Saturday. We window shopped, ate at the food court, and sat on Santa's lap. Good times.

Jovie and Tralee waiting to sit on Santa's lap. In case you were wondering, Tralee put her outfit together. Lovely.

Hunter waiting in line. Look at Oakley's face in the background. She wasn't happy about something. Don't worry Oaks, it's almost our turn to see Santa.

This was the first year Tralee walked right up to Santa without trepidation. She also got right down to business. After the first hug she said, "I want a toy that goes like this." Then she started to mimic rocking a baby. Cute!

Hunter, Oakley, Jovie, and Tralee sitting with Santa. This was the first year Hunter saw Santa too, but he was more impressed with all the fake snow surrounding the photo area than seeing the Man-in-Red.

If you're thinking, "Wow! These next few pictures look like they belong in a Pottery Barn catalog, you would be close! We were in the Pottery Barn store. Tralee and Jovie both took a chair and started reading the books Santa gave them. A few minutes later Tralee said, "We're relaxing!" They're too cute!

That was our big night out.

Simple, fun, fantastic!

Tired Self Partaking of Some Love Soup

If you know me well (I mean REALLY well) you know I'm not the most pleasant person to be around when I'm running low on sleep. I'm a brat really if I don't get a solid six or so. The last few nights have been rough in the shut-eye department. The night before last Tralee peed the bed which woke everyone up when I started the steam cleaner. Jim's out of town, so I had to deal with this situation all by my lonesome. After I got everything cleaned up, and the laundry going, I was too wired to fall back asleep. When I finally started drifting off, I heard Hunter's morning request, "MILK!" loud and clear which was my cue to get up and fulfill my motherly duties. A sippy cup full of milk later, and I was able to lay back down for a bit while the kids climbed all over me. I rested, but the sandman stayed at bay.

Last night Hunter woke up at 4am, a bit earlier than usual with his milk request. I got him his sippy cup and an hour later he fell back asleep (thankfully), but I had some stuff for my primary lesson I needed to finish, so I just stayed up and took care of it. Again, when I finally felt like I could fall back asleep the kids were up and ready to groove. Jim's usually the one to get up with the kids in the morning and let me sleep an extra hour or so before he leaves for work. I LOVE him for that, but when he's out of town, I get no extra hour. So, to sum it up, I'm TIRED!!!

I was hoping for a nice Sunday nap after church today. I thought to myself, "If I feed the kids, and then put on a movie, maybe I can sneak into my bedroom and take a little snooze." Yeah, that didn't happen. Hunter followed me in, and began using my body as a launching pad to jump from. I layed him down a few times and sternly told him, "It's time for night night! Go to sleep!" He laughed in my face. I tried laying him in his own bed, then going back to my own, only to hear Tralee and Hunter jumping on his bed squealing with delight a few minutes later. They eventually found their way back into my bedroom where I was finally getting to that super comfortable state right before you drift off to sleep. They climbed up by me as I pretended I was sleeping, hoping they would give up on me. They didn't. Tralee started whispering in my ear, "Mommy. I'm still hungry. Wake up. Wake up. Wake up. Wake up. I'm hungry!" I still didn't move until the fowl aroma of Hunter's dirty diaper seeped into my nose. At this point I slammed the covers off of me, got up and said (maybe it was more like I yelled), "FINE!! I give up!!!"

I went about my motherly duties with a grump on my face. I changed Hunter's bum (for the third time today) while asking him, "Didn't you JUST poop after church? Why did you go and poop again?" I fixed Tralee another plate of food while lecturing her, "If you were still hungry you should have told me while I had all the lunch stuff out earlier!" So basically, I was a tired grump. In the middle of one of my scowls I noticed Tralee tentatively creeping into the kitchen, then she said in a voice that could melt butter it was so sweet,

"Mom. You're mad at me, but you need to be patient too. You're a grown up. I'm a little girl."

Yup.

I melted.

I ran over to Tralee, scooped her up into my arms, and told her how much I love her. I apologized for yelling, and told her that she's such a good girl. I fixed her more food with an extra dollop of love, and vowed to not let my grumpy tired self take over again. . . EVER!

I know what I signed up for when I decided to become a mother, but not really. People always tell you it's the hardest job in the world, but you can't really understand what "hard" is until you're up all night pacing the floor with your sick child praying that they'll just get comfortable enough to fall back asleep. Wishing that you could get EVERY sickness for them so they never have to feel pain. People also warn, "you'll be tired" but that doesn't even cover half of what I sometimes feel. The kind of tired I feel as a mother is completely different than the tired I've ever felt before. And it never goes away.

And then there's the worrying. Worrying that you're not a good enough mom. Worrying that you didn't spend enough quality time with them today. Worrying about too much TV time. Worrying that they didn't eat enough fruits, veggies, and protein. Worrying that their teeth will rot if you let them eat another piece of candy. Worrying that you didn't read to them enough, or spend enough learning time with them. Worrying that every time you sit on the computer, decide to clean, or work on a craft you're neglecting the quality time you SHOULD be spending with the babies. Worry what someone would think if they dropped in and saw your house looking the way it does (like a giant toy box puked all over the floor). Worrying about other kids being nice to them on the playground. Worrying about the runny nose they have and praying that it doesn't turn into a full fledged cold. The worrying also never ends. Yet, if I could go back in time to my childless self, I would sign up all over again for this crazy train of parenting. Yes I'm tired a lot, and yes my house is NEVER clean, and YES sometimes I lock myself in my closet just to get a minute to myself. But as crazy as it sounds, it's all worth it. Every hour of sleep I've lost, every cold dinner I've eaten, every stain on our furniture from leaky sippy cups or paint covered fingers, is all worth it for the moments that melt me into a goopy soup of love.

People warn you that you'll never love a being as much as you will your kids. I ALSO knew this to be true, but not really. I didn't know that I could sit and stare at my child's sleeping face all hours of the night and feel like my heart would burst with love for them. I wasn't aware that watching my child accomplish one of their milestones (crawling, walking, climbing, talking) would feel like the proudest moment of my life. Even more proud than when I graduated from college. I didn't know that I would tear up so easily when my three-year-old begins to understand the concept of Christmas. I've never laughed so hard, as when my kids do or say something so funny I laugh until my sides hurt. Then there are the teaching moments, moments where my kids teach me something (like tonight, with Tralee innocently explaining to me our positions, "you're a grown up. I'm just a little girl.") where I realize just how brilliant, smart, and innocent they are. I wasn't aware of the heart melting capabilities children hold in a glance or a simple sentence. Only my kids could turn me from a brat into a puddle of love in two seconds flat.

Oh how I love them, and I so badly want to be the mother I'm capable of. Cause these two:

They deserve the best.

My Apologies

Dear Man in Blue Jacket at Walgreens,

I'm so very sorry my daughter kept pointing at you while saying, "Mom look! There's an old man!" I know the fact that my face turned bright red as I muffled to you, "I'm sorry" was enough for you to know that I was mortified by my daughter's actions. I also know the fact that she began to sing a made-up song about an old man while we continued our shopping x-ed out my red-faced apology. Thank you for graciously saying, "Well, she's got that right, I AM an old man" instead of giving us the evil-eye. Just to inform you, I explained to my daughter on the way home about how it isn't always polite to call those in your generation "old" . . . at least to their faces. If we ever meet again, I hope it's in less awkward circumstances.

Best to you and yours,

Mother of the Three-Year-Old who Repeatedly Pointed at You While Calling You Old

••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

Dear Woman in a Scooter in Line in Front of Us at Winco,

I'm very sorry my daughter pointed at your hair and said, "look Mom, she has bird brain hair." I know the fact that she said to you, "I like your bird brain hair" didn't make it any less embarrassing for the both of us, but hopefully the knowledge that she's only three will make it a bit more understandable. I have no idea where she learned the term "bird brain" but as far as I can tell, she thinks it's a positive. Furthermore, I thought you, your husband, and your hair all looked lovely and I hope there are no long-lasting hurt feelings. I wish you all the best.

Sincerely,

Mother of a Three-Year-Old that Needs a Lesson or Two in Manners

New Crafty Center

Jim just finished my craft cabinet he's been working on for me. He built it out of a couple of old doors he found at thrift stores and

I LOVE IT!

There's still a bit of tweaking to do, but for now all my craft stuff looks to much nicer than it did before.

Thank you Jim! Thank you for being so creative, kind, and manly. I love when you build me stuff.

Many cute crafts are waiting to be made right here.

Quite a WHAT?

Tralee loves to sing. She loves to make up her own songs, substitute words in songs she already knows, belt out the old classics, she just LOVES to sing. Sometimes Jim and I scratch our heads at some of her lyrics. For instance, she likes the old classic, Mary had a Little Lamb. She says it's a "purple" song. Purple and pink songs are songs she likes. Orange and blue songs are songs she doesn't like (don't worry, we're still Boise State fans, apparently our daughter just doesn't like their team colors). While in the car the other night she was singing the purply song Mary had a Little Lamb and Jim and I had to ask her to sing it again to make sure we heard her correctly. She's sang it a few times since, and the lyrics are still the same. Instead of:

". . . its fleece is white as snow" Tralee sings,

". . . its fleece is quite a hoe."

We're sure it's just a technical oversight, and we're trying to fix the lyrics in Tralee's version. Until she gets it right, Mary's lamb's fleece seems to be a little scandalous.

Tralee said a few other things lately that got us laughing. After she got out of the tub the other night I rubbed lotion on her as she was crouched down in her towel. I asked her to, "stand up straight please" so I could get to the areas that weren't accessible to me in her crouched position to which she replied, "I don't want to stand up straight. I want to stand up small."

The other cute thing Tralee told me was, "I'm not upside down, I'm up-side-up."

Not to be out-sillied by his sister, Hunter had us laughing yesterday when he hid behind the Christmas tree, started grunting like he was lifting a grand piano, and through one of the grunts said, "I pooping." Yeah, we were rolling. Sorry if you don't like poop-talk. It's a regular topic in our household. Hunter fits right in.

What did we ever do for entertainment before kids?

Tralee's Letter to Santa and other Christmas-y Things

A few nights ago I sat down with Tralee and asked her if she would like to write Santa a letter. This is currently the extent of Tralee's letter writing capabilities if asked to do it all by herself:

So, I offered my secretarial services and asked her to dictate to me what she would like to say to our laugh-his-belly-like-a-bowl-full-of-jelly gift giver. The following is what Tralee asked me to write. I only helped a little to get her started. 97% of the letter is all Tralee, 3% is me helping her along.

Dear Santa,

How are you? My name is Tralee. I'm three. Santa, thank you for giving us presents. I measured for you. I want a baby that goes like this (jumping). I would like Hungry Hippos. I also would like a talking doll. I need an alligator, hungry and it eats some food. I want two pillow pets and some dancing shoes. Thank you.

Love,

Tralee Marie Jacobs

I'm pretty sure Santa knows what most of this stuff is, and if Tralee continues to be a good girl she'll get most of it. When I checked with the cookie-and-milk-loving-papa-elf he was scratching his head a bit at the alligator request. We're also not sure what Tralee measured for him. Perhaps the width of our heat vents, since we have no chimney for him to come down in. St. Nick was also touched that the first thing Tralee said was, "thank you." Such a sweetie!

A sometimes very ODD girl, as you can tell by these pictures she took of herself on our computer, but a sweetie none-the-less.

As for Hunter, when I checked with Santa, he had some good ideas for our little guy. Can't wait!

In other Christmas news. We've been reading from a book my Grandma gave us when we were first married. There's a scripture, story, and song for each day leading up to Christmas. We've never done it before, and I really hope we start reading from this book every year, cause it's quite exceptional. The kids don't really get all of it, but it does bring the spirit of Christmas into our home.

I'm really enjoying this holiday season. It's the first Christmas in two years that we're not moving. We actually put up a tree (a REAL one that smells HEAVENLY), lights, and other decor that were all but forgotten the last few years. It's a wonderful thing, this time of year! I lurve it! Hope everyone else is enjoying it as much as our little family.

Oh My Stinkin' Cute!!

I was watching some old youtube videos of my babies and came across this one from a little less than a year ago. I forgot just how cute and chubbalicious Hunty was! He was a CHUNK!! Those cheeks. OH! Those cheeks!!! I miss them! I also miss his toothless smile. Why do babies have to grow up so fast? At least I have this video to look back on when I miss just how chubby those cheeks were. I mean, they're still pretty cute and kissable (I'm averaging about 10,000 kisses a day), but now-a-days they've transformed into a little boy's bouncy cheeks, not quite as fat, squishy, and cherubic as they once were. Again, still kissable, just not as babyish as they used to be. This video almost (almost) makes me baby hungry. Enjoy.

For the Birds

On our drive home from the SLC airport a month ago, we stayed overnight in Logan to catch a few winks before returning home. On our pit stop, we visited first dam to feed the ducks and geese. Holy cannoli were these fowls aggressive!! Luckily, none of them were mean-spirited, just VERY VERY aggressive! It kind of felt like we were in the movie The Birds, only the birds were ducks and geese, and instead of pecking you to death, they just trampled all over you to get more food. I finally told Tralee to sit on the table and toss them crackers, so she could gage the feeding situation a little better without having her shirt/pants/hands/shoes nibbled upon by the greedy geese. Even with the overwhelming amount of feathered friends surrounding us, we still had a blast. Tralee didn't want to leave.

I promised her we'd come back, and I'm sure we will. . . one day.

Snowman Make-over

Most of our drive back home was uneventful, then the snow started to fall. It fell the last half of our trip. By the time we got home, we weren't all that surprised to see white fluff all over our yard and driveway. We did the typical thing you do when there's an abundance of snow, we played in it!!

Our first creation was this giant snowman.

He lasted a day until Jim decided Snowster needed a make-over, so he transformed him into a Christmas Elf/Garden Gnome type thing. We like to look out the window as cars slow down to gaze upon him. It's also fun to see the kids walking home from school. They usually stop at the end of our driveway and make funny faces at our little dude. I think I'll name him Halwid Meriment Gleevesglinger. We'll call him Hal for short.

Here's Hal's juicy double pictured below.

When Jim's out of town, I'll be glad to have Hal as a back-up man of the house, that is, unless of course, he melts. Which he probably will eventually.

And. . . We're back!

We're back from our St. George/Las Vegas vacation. I took my camera, but forgot the card-thingy (memory card) at home. Whoops! So, not a whole lot of pictures to document our trip. However, we did get some on our phones, and we DID take our camcorder (is that what they're called now-a-days?). Sooner or later I'll get an awesome video up here for all to see. Until I get the super-awesome video done, here's another video of us on our way up to St. George. My favorite parts are when Tralee sings something about a time-machine (I didn't even know she knew what a time machine was), and when she says, "I don't want to take a picture, cause I'm a kitty cat." Enjoy:

As for the rest of our trip, we did the typical Thanksgiving-y things on our visit:

- Ate lots of yummy food

- Visited with family and friends (Adrienne and her girls, some friends of Jim and Adrienne's from Canada, John, Cassi, and their two -soon to be three - little ones, and Sue, Dan, and their million kiddos -- really just five, but after three kids I tend to loose track).

- Shopped (I showed Adrienne the joys of coupon shopping)

-Got my hair and toe-nails done

- Golfed

- Swam

- Ate some more

- Sewed

- Ate

- Cooked

- Shopped again

- Ate

- Watched movies

- Relaxed

- Played Wii

-Played with our cute nieces and nephews

- I think I forgot to mention that we ate

- Figured out that my android phone can be used like a kindle, and LOVED it! I read some "books" while I was vacationing. Cool beans!

- We also ate

All and all, it was a good trip. Poor lil' Hunty got sick the last few nights of our visit. He was puking all over and it made me sad. I don't like it when my kids are sick. Why can't they just be healthy all the time? I know why -- something about opposition in all things and it builds up their immune systems -- but still!!! I don't EVER want my kids to suffer in the least, and it really sucks when they do. Mostly they're happy healthy little munchkins, and I'm THANKFUL for that. So very very thankful for the cute little beings I must teach, protect, and nurture. I'm thankful that I get to be their mom. How lucky am I? Like, the luckiest person EVER!!

I'm also lucky that I get to hug my strong, handsome, virile, manly-man of a hubbster whenever I so choose. Really, it's a treat because he's so very comfortable to snuggle. I know I've mentioned that tid-bit of info before, but seriously, Jim it the MOST COMFORTABLE person to fall asleep on. Jim's like the sealy posterpedic/temper-pedic/sleep number/high falootin-ist of people to catch a few zzz's on. In fact, I think I might just go give it a go. I'm tired. The kids are asleep in bed, and Jim is watching a little boobtube downstairs. I might just go join him, and maybe fall asleep right there in his arms. Try not to be jealous. Really, don't be, cause he'll probably fart right when I start to dose off. It's the price I pay for marrying a manly-man.

It's good to be home.