Gettin' Jolly

Thanksgiving could not come and go fast enough for me this year.  I am usually all about taking time to respect the Turkey and even (generally) conform to John's views that Christmas music and eggnog consumption should be limited to the month of December.  But this year...what can I say?  I've been feeling extra festive and have overtly flaunted my Christmas Cheer in front of my disapproving husband.  I love being able to share the meaning of the holidays with the girls...especially now that Audrey can understand more complex concepts than: Hey, look!  Lights! or Wohoo!! Presents! 

Instead we've been discussing what it means to be needy or less fortunate, why the birth of Jesus was so overwhelmingly awesome, and most importantly, why we should be generous, kind and make an effort to give to others as an extension of our joy.  Maybe by the time the girls are mothers it will have hit home. 

While I wish I were staunch enough to stick simply to those concepts, I am a sucker for the comfort of tradition.  So, we've been observing many of the traditions that remind John and me of the holiday seasons we spent growing up.  The day after Thanksgiving, we pulled the ole artificial tree out of it's box and set it up in the living room.  Shortly thereafter, we realized that almost all of the old lights were kaput.  Now, hopefully purchasing new lights every few years will become a thing of the past since we replaced ours with LED's...which Jeff informed me will last until the girls are my age.  I'm holding him to that.

Even after purchasing lights, we further put off decorating the tree to observe small business Saturday and I am so glad we did.  Supporting local businesses appeals to almost every aspect of my personality, so we really enjoyed bumming around downtown Richland, finding some presents for family at our local Kitchen supply store (Ariel's) and splurging on some amazing cheese and wine at Cheese Louise.  We ate lunch at Fat Olive's and stopped by Kelley's bakery on the way home to get a cake for Oliver's early first birthday celebration.   

After the littles were all up from their naps, we strapped the D-Man into his high chair, sang to him and sat around gawking as he studiously ate his birthday cake.  Since we will miss out on Ollie's actual birthday shindig, we couldn't pass up the opportunity to shower him with cake and presents for the first time. 

Just as dusk hit, we finally started decorating the Christmas tree; the Audrey girl took to this with a very serious attitude.  John brought out a chair for her to stand on and she set out to make ours the best-looking tree on the block.  The ever-rambunctious Bailey even did a pretty decent job of getting ornaments in their proper place.  On the whole, it was a really nice day to embrace the coming of Christmas.  The kiddos had some great play time (potentially inspired by their cake-induced sugar highs) in the Christmas Tree box.  Seriously.  How are we going to top that dang box with Christmas gifts this year?

 Since then, we've been listening to Christmas music (Bailey is not happy about this development as it cuts into her audio book time) decorating with poinsettias, eating candy canes, drinking eggnog, making gingerbread, and are gearing up for our big St. Nicholas Day event this year.  (Yes, I'm going to leave you hanging on that one)  Most of all, I'm thankful that Thanksgiving is over so I don't have to feel guilty about the compulsion to go all Jolly on everyone.