Drudy Family Christmas

Although Isaac was still less than impressed with all of the presents wrapped up under the tree for him, it was quite an enchanting Christmas nonetheless. This picture was taken Christmas Eve, anxiously awaiting my parents' arrival. "Why so anxious," one might ask? Well, we expected to make homemade popcorn and begin the first of several games of 500 of the evening. Actually, we forgot to make the popcorn and ended up watching the 17 & Counting marathon on TLC until we put the boys to bed around 8 o'clock. Then we played 500 & Pit.

My parents left around 10 o'clock. Keith & I got ourselves all ready for bed, brought the presents downstairs (they were "hidden" in the spare bedroom) and arranged them under the tree, made some herbal tea, curled up under our blankets, and spent the rest of Christmas Eve watching my all-time favorite Christmas movie, It's a Wonderful Life!

Fiberoptics, nativities (even if they were porcelein), Nutcrackers, and snowglobes were a few of Isaac's favorite things this Christmas season.

Isaac quickly figured out how to plug this one in on his own-not the safest thing for a not-quite-two-year-old to know, but what are you going to do? He also enjoyed taking the little train off of its tracks several times a day and then saying, "I'll fix it!"

Even though we filled the stockings as we bought things, it never occurred to Isaac to look in them. The two ridiculously enormous stocking, the teddy bear & the snowman, are Isaac and Josiah's stockings, of course!

See that snowglobe he's reaching for with his right hand? About thirty seconds after this pictures was taken, Isaac went into the bathroom to go potty, and dropped the snowglobe on the tile floor, shattering it into a million pieces. The nutcracker was actually part of a centerpiece that Keith & I won at the Westinghouse Christmas party earlier in December.

My first ever real Christmas tree. Among the reasons why my parents said we shouldn't get a real one were, 1) it will catch fire and burn the house down, and 2) Maggie will pee on it. I'm happy to say neither of those two occurred. It did, however, fall over once. There were only three casualties, one of which was one of my favorite Gone With the Wind ornaments! Keith bought some superglue though and fixed it perfectly! Keith also went out and bought a new, bigger tree stand. While it was completely decorated and everything we transferred it from its old, smaller stand into the new one. Never fell over again! Nor has it caught fire or been peed on by the dog.

We finally went to bed around 12:30am on Christmas Eve. Actually, I guess it was technically Christmas Day already. Josiah stirred a little around 1:30am but easily went back to sleep on his own. Either because we had drunk some wine, ate tons of cookies, or had gone to bed so late, neither of us slept well. The boys woke for the morning around 7:30am. I took videos of us going into their bedrooms and getting them out of their cribs. They had no idea that it was any different from any other day. I recorded Keith carrying them both down the stairs, trying to catch their first reaction to all of the presents (which I now remember that I forgot to take a picture of). Josiah was actually much more impressed with all of the brightly wrapped boxes than Isaac. Isaac didn't get it at all, until we started opening of course!

We began with the stockings. In each of their stockings they got some books, puzzles, needed personal care items, and appropriate treats; teething biscuits and Gerber snacks for Josiah, peppermint patties for Isaac, which are his favorite candy. Next comes the presents. By this time Isaac is just beginning to notice the Elmo & Cars wrapping paper. We opened all of Isaac's gifts first, and then Josiah's. Among Isaac's gifts were a Thomas the Train tent, a Magna-doodle, a dump truck and a fire engine. Josiah got the Fischer Price Laugh & Learn Home, bath toys, a little basketball net with little balls, and one of those Fischer Price toys where you flip a switch or turn a nob and different animals pop up (I don't know the official name of it, sorry!). Naturally, Josiah was all up in Isaac's stuff, and vice versa. Any suggestions for how to help them both distinguish their toys from one another's? Or should we just stop trying now?

Next Keith & I opened our stockings and gifts. We do the same thing with our stockings as we do for the boys, stuffing them with candy, personal care items, and some fun stuff. I got Keith a lot of clothes this year, as he's lost so much weight he basically needs a whole new wardrobe. I also got him a Redwings Christmas ornament, as he always complains that the tree is covered in ornaments I had before I met him and none of the ornaments are his. A couple of other neat things were The Universe Seasons 1 & 2 DVD's (he loves watching those shows on the History Channel), and a gift bag full of various types of malt powder. For a long time he's wanted to make me homemade Belgian waffles, but said we had to have malt powder. After going to Giant Eagle, Community Market, McGinnis Sisters, and calling Whole Foods and Trader Joe's, I had to purchase the malt powder from King Arthur Flour online. One of my favorite gifts was my Steelers hoodie (which, I'm embarassed to say is my first ever Steelers apparel). I also got a couple of books on my list of things to read, Prince Caspian DVD, some Bath & Body Works stuff, and a new outfit fom Aeropostale.

With our family room ransacked by Christmas presents and wrapping paper, we then made Belgian waffles for breakfast. I was amazed that Isaac ate two whole waffles. Josiah had his usual baby oatmeal. (Sorry JoZo, next year you can have a waffle!) I tried my best to clean up/organize the family room before we all headed upstairs to get ready for the day.

Around noon we went to my parents' house. We were the first there, so we opened the boys stockings as soon as we arrived. My mother also stuffs stockings with needed personal items, treats, and some fun little toys. Then Mackenzie and Damian arrived and immediately did their own ransacking of my parents' living room by opening their stockings and gifts. I decided to wait to open Isaac & Josiah's gifts as they didn't even notice they had presents to open. Next it was time for Christmas dinner: ham, scalloped potatoes, broccoli casserole, and coleslaw. There were other things, I just didn't eat them. Oh, and did I mention...tons of cookies!

Josiah soon had to lay down for a much-needed nap, so I took advantage of that time to try & open presents with Isaac. There couldn't be anything Isaac was less interested in than opening presents! As we started showing him things, though, he got into it, again. My mom got him so many neat things. One really cool thing was a big easel with chalk and magnetic letters and numbers. We also opened our gifts from my parents while Josiah was napping. Again, my mom got us so much cool stuff: The Office trivia game, a couple new Gone With the Wind Scarlett O'Hara ornaments, new bedsheets, a digital photo ornament. I think my favorite though were name plaques for Isaac & Josiah, with the meaning of their names. We knew the meaning of their names already, that's why we chose them, but it's so nice to have something to frame and put in their bedrooms.

When Josiah woke up we opened his gifts of course. He, too, got many cool things from my mom. And again, Isaac and Josiah were all into each other's things. I'm taking suggestions on how to alleviate that crisis when Isaac sees Josiah playing with one of his things and frantically exclaims, "Share, brother!" as he's yanking the toy out of Josiah's hands.

After that, we had to load up our truck with all of the gifts (and Maggie) and take them home, because there was no way we could fit everything in the truck with the boys & Maggie in it! After taking everything into the house, we went back to my mom's to get the boys and then headed to my Aunt Dar's house. Seems like it's been years since I went to my Aunt Dar's on Christmas, so it was nice to be there again. One of my younger cousins has a baby girl who is just a little older than Josiah, so it was really fun to watch them look at each other and play around one another.

We finally got home around 9pm, promptly put the boys to bed, again organized the family room, and went to bed ourselves. Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!

Below are some more cute pictures of our Christmas.