Christmas Highlights

Today was our first day back in the swing of things. David is back at school after his Christmas break was extended by a couple of well timed snow days. Wednesday's are also when I go to work each week for the day in a little church office, which means Fordycakes spent the day with his babysitter/adopted grandmother. We were all back at it.

Can I be honest with you? I was a little ready. I like the tiniest hint of a routine. I'm the type of person who needs motivation to put on real clothes. Left to my own devices I'd just be in my pajamas all the time.

I so throughouly enjoyed Christmas, though. Having David home and spending time with family is such a treat. Let's close out Christmas break with a little recap of Christmas highlights, shall we?

We took Ford to see Santa Clause. I had taught him all about Santa and upon seeing his likeness he would proudly yell, "Ho, ho, ho!" It is adorable. Naturally. Santa in person, however, was a different story. He didn't cry, but he did give Santa a very serious and skeptical stare down.

Christmas was much more exciting with Ford this year because he understood that things were different and special and he could participate in some of the traditional kid festivities of the season.

Look at this little baby last year during his first Christmas. 

Now direct your addition to this giant toddler. Where did my baby go? 

A seasoned Christmas veteran, he's actually a little Christmas ham. He thinks he is the funniest person around. 

This year we spent Christmas with my parents at the farm. It's a very restful place to be. We all took many many naps. Ford slept in the bed with my parents and was praised for being such a good eater each time he polished off another cookie. But whose to complain when Mommy and Daddy are getting to nap? 

As Christmas day drew closer, David and I (and everyone else, really) had a great time playing Santa. I was working on making Ford a teepee and on Christmas eve David and Jonathon and my dad all worked late into the night in the freezing cold to put together the rest of his toys. 

There was one among us, though who could not wait until Christmas morning to give little Fordy his gift. Uncle Jon Jon was so excited to give Ford his present that he gave it to him the day before. He couldn't stand to wait any longer. How sweet is that, I ask you?

But Ford did not complain because his present was AWESOME! It's a little jeep that's like a big wheel and Ford can drive it himself when he's bigger but for now it operates by remote control. 

Ford thinks that it is amazing and that he is an exceptionally skillful driver. 

All he wanted to do everyday was ride in his little jeep. Thanks Uncle Jon Jon for loving this little guy so much and for such a fun gift. 

Here are my two fellas on Christmas eve. This is just after my family's annual snack supper, which is one of David's favorite traditions and maybe now one of Ford's . He ran around all night using his charm and good looks to con people out of the food on their plates. Few can resist him. 

This is what Santa had ready for Ford on Christmas morning. I was so excited about how well his teepee turned out. I'll do a separate blog post with the details about it.

We had to wake the sleepy head up on Christmas morning. We were much more excited than he was.

But it did not take long for him to wake up and realize there were new things to play with!

He really liked opening presents this year. He couldn't quite understand why he needed to stop playing with one present to open another, though. I'm sure if we dwelled on that for long we could draw some good metaphors or life lessons from it, but let's just keep opening presents for the time being, ok? 

After opening gifts inside, there was still a present from Papa and Mema for this outside loving little boy- A big play set. 

You'll notice that Ford is dressed for success in his Christmas long all, bear hat, camo jacket, and John Deere boots. He's very fashion forward. 

One thing that is not forward is his slide technique.

It's the way all the cool kids are doing it these days. 

Besides Ford's antics, the thing that kept us most entertained during Christmas was my Dad's new cows. 

There was even a baby born on Christmas eve!

Sweet sleepy girl. Being born is rough stuff. Every time Ford saw the calves he said "Awwwwww." 

Hey, Mama.

Cow whisperers. 

Ford also says, "boo" instead of "moo." It's funny every single time. 

We had a great Christmas. We got a lot of fun stuff, but more importantly we enjoyed being together. I'm thankful for our little family. I'm thankful for the Christmas season and the freshness that Ford brings to our traditions.

As we move into the season of Epiphany, I have taken our Christmas decorations down but have also encountered a slight problem. The baby Jesus from our "Little People" nativity scene is MIA.

"You will find him wrapped in swaddling clothes lying in a manager…" or perhaps we will find him covered in goldfish crumbs stuffed in the couch cushions.

May we all seek and find Him this year.
Blessings to you in this new year.
Melissa

Baby Christmas

Happy New Year, friends! I hope that the holiday season was wonderful for you and yours. Ours was great. We spent time with family, enjoyed watching Ford experience another Christmas, and spent most days in our stretchy pants. What's not to love? Ford and I will be very sad when Daddy has to go back to work on Monday and everything goes back to normal.

Just before Chrsitmas, we had a little party at our house with Ford's little play group. We have the best group of baby friends and mommies. All of the babies are first children and were born within about 5 months of each other. We have SO enjoyed spending time together. "Play group" is really just code for mommies gathering for advice, support, venting, laughing, and getting out of the house before we kill somebody.

Anyway, we decided to get everyone together for what came to be known as BABY CHRISTMAS!

We are in a new house and it was fun to decorate it for Christmas this year. Below you'll see our traditional Christmas Ukulele. And there appears to be a Christmas Sprite, as well. Someone needs to do a better job staging these pictures. 

You'll see our semi-baby friendly tree is perched high out of reach. 

I put out lots of stars because it's an object that Ford can identify. And I taught him to say "ho, ho, ho." Adorable. 

But back to the party. We had it in the morning and everyone brought yummy brunch treats and the babies wore their Christmas PJs.

My mom brought us cookies from a sweet little bakery in Fitzgerald, called Our Daily Bread. Aren't they cute?

And little gingerbread cookie favors with each of the baby's names on them.

Christmas china? Check.

Stripy straws? Check. 

Individual Milks? Check. Looks like a party to me. 

It's getting harder and harder to get a picture of these tots all together. They are much too movey and squirmy now. And they have their own ideas about what they want to do.

The nerve.

This one's pretty good, but we're missing somebody.

Oh, there she is. No pictures for Zoey, thank you very much. 

Ford decides to steal Emmaline's snack.

And then run away. 

Shesh. 

Babies played with the Nativity set, listened to Christmas music, ate snacks, and kept us busy running from room to room.

We also made a little Christmas craft.

Painting baby feet is easiest when they are in a highchair- although they are confused and curious about what you are doing to them. 

This was our end product- footprint Christmas trees!

It's such a joy to watch these little rascals grow up together and to get to celebrate holidays in special baby ways. We may have sippy cups instead of mimosas but we are enjoying it together! 

Baby's First Christmas = Parent's First Christmas

Baby's first Christmas is a funny thing.

It's really fun and exciting to have this new little person to celebrate with and give things to, but the truth of the matter is that they are just too little to really "get" what's going on, even in the most basic sense.  Really I think it should be called "Parent's First Christmas" because this is when you, as a parent, get to figure out what your new normal is for the holidays now that baby is in the picture. And as a parent, you are so excited about having baby with you to celebrate and experience all that you love about Christmas.

It is still pretty fun to watch their little reaction to all of the decorations and activities. Of course, our family likes to watch Ford do anything-
The world stops when this boy chews on his toes.
We'll pause a movie to watch him play with a toy.
Everyone around the supper table will let their food get cold listening and provoking him to talk.
And if he sneezes?...Please. We die. (In our defense his sneezes are really cute. Like a puppy sneeze times 5 on the cuteness scale.)
So with that being the norm, Christmas was really just another opportunity for more of the same.

Anyway, since he really wasn't able to actively participate much in the yuletide celebration this year, we decided to keep Christmas pretty simple while we can still get away with it! And as Ford grows, it's easy to add to our traditions and festivities but it's quite hard to scale down what you've already started. We're not trying to be grinch-y. We just want to make decisions that make our celebrations more meaningful and less busy.

Here are 3 things that we did for "Parent's First Christmas":

First, we picked a few activities that Ford would enjoy or would be fun memories for our family but left out those things that didn't seem worth the hassle. For example, we took Ford to see Christmas lights and meet Santa but we didn't pay to go to an elaborate light display because to Ford, lights are lights. We didn't bake cookies because it would probably end in me being frustrated and tired rather than full of yuletide cheer.

Second, rather than giving Ford lots of little gifts from us, we decided to give him one special gift that would be a keepsake. This wouldn't go over so well when he's older and understands the concept of Christmas gifts, but this year it's perfect. And he'll always be able to say what he got for his first Christmas present. And don't worry... the grandparents had Ford covered in the present department!

Lastly, I love hosting and going to holiday parties but this year that all seemed a little daunting. It would be really difficult to plan something elaborate at our stage of life right now and going to parties is a little more difficult since Fordycakes crashes around 8 pm. In light of all this, we decided to host a neighborhood 5k! We called it the Hot Cocoa 5k and invited our neighbors, friends, and family to come  run or walk a 5k route that David mapped out and then hang out at our house to drink hot chocolate and eat snacks. We supplied the hot cocoa and planned the race and everyone brought a snack to share.  It was a easy, family friendly, low key get together with a fun twist that made it special. The race was also a really great way to get to know people in our neighborhood that we usually only speak to in passing. We hope to make the Hot Cocoa 5k a yearly tradition. It was a perfect fit for us.

And this is what our Christmas looked like-

We spent Thanksgiving in Florida with David's parents and in the little town where they live there's a huge Christmas season kickoff called "Light Up Mount Dora." They have tons of Christmas lights everywhere throughout the town square park.  This was Ford's first Christmas activity and he LOVED it. He couldn't get enough of the lights.

That same night, Ford also met Santa! Ford was unsure of both Santa and the outfit Mommy picked out for him. You can't say he wasn't festive!

Back at home, we went to pick out a Christmas tree- our first as a family of three! David and I have a tradition of going to get Starbucks and then going on a fairly extensive hunt to find the perfect tree. Our perfect tree used to come from a swanky tree farm...now it comes from Lowe's because we discovered the joys of the bargain tree.

Do you ever ask strangers to take your picture? It almost always turns out like this- drunk eyed dad or some equally non-frameable result. I know I'm imposing on their Lowe's trip, but come on! Look at us! Baby's first Christmas!

Then you inevitably resort to the phone self portrait. Sigh. 

And yes, Ford is wearing shorts whilst picking out our Christmas tree. Welcome to Georgia. 

Fordy liked the Christmas lights in Mount Dora so much that we decided to add a little exterior illumination to our own Christmas decor. The chicken coop got the full Griswold treatment!

We spent the week of Christmas at my parent's house. (Many of you have asked and yes, the farm house is done! I'll have to give you the full tour some time.) It was nice to be home with our whole family. 

Look at Papa and Mema...happier than pigs in mud. 

We went to the Christmas Eve candle light service with our whole family at the church that I grew up in and where David and I were married. It's funny to take Ford there now. 

On Christmas morning we woke up bright and early to open gifts! Here's our little family on our first Christmas morning. This is the present that we gave Ford...more on that later!

Everyone watched Ford open all of his gifts first. Babies are very entertaining. 

Here he is after opening all of his gifts! (See, I told you that the grandparents had him covered!)

That face.

After watching Ford open all of his gifts, we put him in this box while the rest of us opened ours! Just kidding...kind of. 

We spend the rest of the day playing, eating, napping, and hanging out together.

Christmas is sooooo different with a little nugget. I guess that stands to reason because our whole life is so much different. It's better, for sure, but changes are always interesting! We had a very merry Christmas and we hope that you did, too. I can't wait to see how our holiday traditions change and grow with our little family. I'm grateful for a chance to take things slow and easy during a phase of life that is a little hectic most of the time. 

Happy New Year!

mel