Growing Up Wenzler: Christmas 2013

We headed to spend Christmas at my mom and step-dad’s house in Alabama on Saturday the 21^st. We made the trip in about seven hours, which seemed like a record for us! Since, we didn’t manage to get on the road until nearly noon, we didn’t arrive until 7:00. Keith fed the kids dinner while I quickly set up beds for the kids and we had everyone down by about 8:30 or so.

We took it easy around the house on Sunday morning.

When Daniel went down for his nap, my mom and I took Etta and Alice out to run errands. After a few texts back and forth, we realized that my sister, Deanne was JUST rolling into town and we asked if she wanted to meet us for lunch and she did. So, we met up at the K-Mart and she hopped in the van and we went over to Panera for lunch.

Her first time in a restaurant high chair.

All of the dropped apple slices. Pixie is all, "uh oh"

We had planned to take D back to her car after lunch so she could go to the house and get settled in, but she decided that she’d join us on our girl’s only adventure running errands to PetSmart and Wal-mart. I wouldn’t really recommend going to Wal-mart on the Sunday before Christmas, but it wasn’t too terrible and we were able to grab the things we needed to grab. Then, we hurried back home to get a bottle for Pixie. We took it easy around the house the rest of the night.

Daniel is obsessed with The Polar Express movie. He and Etta have watched this movie at least once a day since the 5th of this month.

*Note*- Mom and I wrapped some presents after the kids went to bed on Sunday. It was during that time that my nose started running. I was suddenly sniffling so much that my mom asked if I was crying. It felt like seasonal allergies, but I found out the next day that it was a bit of a cold, and Alice had apparently caught the worst of it...

Monday (December 23^rd), the kids spent the morning hanging out with their cousins and their Aunt Dee.

When Daniel and Alice went down for their naps, Deanne and I took Etta up to Fred’s to poke around for a bit. After Daniel got up from his nap, we made gingerbread houses. My kids LOVED the frosting and sampling all of the candy!

^^Daniel's little feet in this one!^^

He's shouting "AH TA!!!" = Daniel's version of "ta da"!

After we decorated our gingerbread houses, we bundled up and headed out to this Holiday Village place. I never caught the exact name of it, but we really enjoyed the evening! They pick you up from the parking area and give you a little hay ride into the little village with all of the lights. The first thing we did was find Santa. I wanted to do this while the line wasn't too long and while my kids were still fresh. I was prepared for at least one of them to have a screaming fit (*cough**cough**Daniel**cough*), but I nearly fell over when Daniel smiled real big and climbed up in the guy’s lap!!! I’m not sure if it’s the fact that he’s watched Polar Express about 20 times this month (seriously), but he seemed to know who Santa was and had no problem telling him hello. In fact, he didn't want to leave when it was time to go. Sweet boy! (For the record, Kessler says this was NOT the real Santa because he didn't have glasses. Never mind the terribly fake beard!)

We did a lot of exploring (especially when I noticed at one point that Etta wasn't wearing her glasses and we retraced our steps over and over until I finally found them). There were lots of little places to have food and we grabbed a quick hot dog for the kids (by the way, the food was reasonably priced for a place like this).

Then we headed over to a kids’ play area and boy did they PLAY!!

Eventually, we were all a little worn out and it was time for the hayride back to the car,

(VIDEO)

On Tuesday, Christmas Eve, my mom and I went up to the mall to wrap presents for charity, as we do every year. I had told Keith to bring the kids up to the mall that morning so we could do a photo with the REAL Santa since we had not done one yet this year and since every year when we go wrap presents on Christmas Eve there is NEVER a line for Santa. So, Keith showed up with the kids and I finished working on the giant hedge trimmer someone had brought in for me to wrap and I told my mom I’d be right back and I met Keith and the kids over at Santa’s Village.

Except, guess what?!?................... You’ll NEVER guess!!...……………. Dang, you guessed right! The line for Santa was AN HOUR LONG!!! Seriously. It wrapped ALLLLLLLL the way around Santa's set-up. What the WHAT?!?

Why did ALL of these people wait until the last minute?! One of those last minute people in line was a friend from high school (great to see you, Candace!) and she told me that she was holding their place in line and her mother had taken her daughter to ride the train. Hmmm… The train, you say? Where might THAT be?

So, Keith stood in line with Alice and I took E and D over to WATCH the train. Then, I saw that it was only $2/each to ride the train and I thought they might get a kick out of that. So, I bought two tickets, which we almost immediately handed back to the lady (I guess it was more symbolic than necessary) and they hopped in a train car and took off around the track. We rode the train no less than four times (Kessler hopped on for a few rounds) and I happily blew through a $20 as this kept them occupied until it was nearly our turn for Santa.

(VIDEO)

Then, we were close enough that I took the kids over to stand in line with Daddy and Alice. Daniel got pretty excited when we were able to spy Santa.

We still had to wait a little and my kids, especially Etta, are not good waiters. There was some writhing on the floor involved. So, by the time we got over to see the Big Guy in Red, EVERYONE was kinda DONE! Santa was really nice, though. Must have been because he was the REAL Santa. ;)

After Santa, we grabbed some lunch in the food court and headed back to the house so the kids could nap and I could wrap some gifts. Keith needed to start his annual Christmas Eve Chili and my little sister, Kimi and her boyfriend, Justin arrived that afternoon. Oh, and so did my Aunts Tammie and Jeanne and cousin, Nick. I also ran up to Dollar General to get some children's Tylenol because Alice felt a bit feverish to me and I knew it would be difficult to find an open store the next day.

poor little sickie

After the kids went to bed that night, we played our annual game of Dirty Santa (the game where you can steal gifts from one another). We (are supposed to) wrap the gifts in brown grocery bags or brown craft paper in honor of my Papa who always wrapped his Christmas presents in paper grocery bags.

Oliver got in on the action.

Nana took FOREVER to choose which one she wanted to open. She had to pick up each one and shake it a couple of times. Ha!

Apparently, Nick is the Animal Whisperer...

Then, everyone went to bed and Santa came!! (I actually went to bed by 2am this year!)

Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.

Christmas morning! My kids were awake for almost an hour before we let them come downstairs. Everyone wanted to be present for the kids' entrance. So, there was a lot of waiting around until everyone was gathered. I even had time to throw a little make-up on, but I stayed in my jammies cause you can't come down for Christmas morning fully dressed. ;)

So, the little car is for Alice, but NO surprise, everyone else wanted a turn in it...

Daniel jumped in next

Etta starts circling... Looking for a way to make it her turn in the car...

YES! She got a turn!

We took a break to have breakfast before settling in to unwrap presents. Daniel had asked for a cookie first thing when he woke up that morning. So, after he ate something "breakfasty", I let them pick out a cookie because it was a special day.

Pretty exciting stuff!

Then, it was back to the gifts!

(VIDEO- I did my best to edit this down, but it's still 8 minutes long... Thank you to Justin for taking most of the videos!)

My step-brother, Adam and his wife, Kim and their son Jaxson arrived! (Jaxson is three weeks younger than Alice.)

You can't really tell from the photos, but Alice was actually pretty sick on Christmas Day. She was really snotty, had a cough, and was running a fever all day (She got pretty hot that night). She was generally whiny and wanted to be held (but wouldn't really go to anyone besides me and Keith)