Christmas Eve

A random Christmas story, to start:

Earlier in the year Elijah was telling the school nurse about Christmas and how excited he was for it to come because we get presents on Christmas.  The nurse asked why he got presents and, to Elijah's credit, he said, "Because it's Jesus' birthday."  The nurse was thrilled by that response and looked at me with immense approval for what we're teaching our children.  She had Elijah give her a hi-5 and then she said, "You should go and tell people that, Elijah.  Too many people forget."  (This was all after hours, by the way.  Not during school.)

Our Holidays were part low-key and part absolute crazy travelness. 

Parties

As far as external parties go, everyone got the memo that Dec. 5th was the day to hold their Christmas party.  This was good because it meant the rest of the month was external-party-obligation-free.

The one that wasn't held on that day was Miciah and Elijah's school concert.  They sang some cute songs and we took videos, but I won't force you to watch them.  Just know that as their parents, we thought they were adorable.

Christmas Week

I made sugar cookies.  From scratch.  I know, hard to believe.  We thought of all the Christmas tradition-y things to do, and sugar cookies was the 1 thing I decided I wanted to do this year.  No gingerbread house.  No chocolate-melting and molding.  Just sugar cookies.  We got together with 2 other families and iced the cookies and generally felt all Christmas-y.

Christmas Eve

And then it was Christmas Eve.  We had planned for weeks to make Rob's Dad's Real Italian Lasagna for Christmas Eve dinner.  It's a special dish because it takes so long to make (you let the red sauce simmer for at least 6 hours).  And then Miciah invited the our friends, the W's, to our house.  She walked up to them at church and said, "Can you come to our house for Christmas Eve?"  This was unplanned, but entirely welcome.  The W's are one of those people that we're eternally in-debt to.  They do such wonderful things for our family.  So it was nice to do something for them.

We ate lasagna and layered jello salad and slush and lots and lots of cookies.  Then we read Luke 2 and  played games with them until 9.  Our boys love their boys, Brian and Ben.  Both of them are older (12 & 19), and larger, so they're fun to wrestle with and harass.  This is Elijah and Teancom showing off their shoes:

Pajamas, Carrying Presents, and Letters to and from Santa 


Like a lot of families, our kids get new pajamas on Christmas Eve.  This year we weren't going to give Miciah any new pajamas because she always has a ton of pajamas, but our cute neighbors secretly gave us 2 pairs of pajamas for her just days before Christmas.  Miciah put them on and said, "These smell like the Jasper's."  No secrets from Miciah.  And when she walked over on Christmas day to say thank you, the Jaspers gave her more presents.  We have great neighbors.  (And wacky kids.)

Then the kids carried the presents from our bedroom to the tree.  That's a Tungate family tradition, and I love it for so many reasons.  Here are some pictures:

Afterwards the kids wrote a letter to Santa.  Miciah wrote it with input from the boys.  It said:
"Dear Santa Claus,
Thank you for coming to us every year!  Teancom left you three presents this year.  He Hopes you like them.  You do not have to take them, thow.  We hope you like the cookies and Milk.  We hope your reindeer like the carrots, too.  The big carrot is for Roudolf.
We also wish you a
Merry Christmas!
Love,
The Thacker family"

Here they are writing the letter:

The gifts Teancom left were belt buckles and buttons and such.  Some of them were actually Elijah's things.  We thought it was cute that Teancom wanted to give Santa something, but Elijah was concerned.  He said, "What if he takes them?"  We told him that Santa wouldn't take his stuff.  (Hence, Miciah's comments in the letter.)

This was Santa's letter back to the family (a Thacker family tradition, as with all the Santa "stuff"):
"Dear Thacker Family,
Thank you for the cookies and milk - they were yummy - and the reindeer loved the carrots!  You are all such good children.  Keep being great.
I love you all, and remember the birth of the Savior all year long.
Love,
Santa
P.S. Teancom, Thank you for the presents... I'll let you keep them.  You are very thoughtful."

The kids were in bed by 10:30 or so, and Rob and I were in bed, feeling absolutely exhausted, by 11:30.  I'm glad Christmas is only once a year!