A Very Pickles Christmas

Our Christmas this past year was very simple.  As much as I love being with family, I do appreciate having the chance to celebrate with just immediate family, reinforcing our family's traditions.

 

Of course, there is the necessary tradition of The Writing Of The Wish List. Miriam very cutely offered to help Joseph with his list, which pretty much consisted of all the vehicles he saw in the Hearthsong catalog.  The kids left their wish lists in their stockings on St. Nicholas' eve, so Santa could look over them before he came back to deliver the big-ticket items on Christmas night.

 We made a lot of our Christmas gifts this year.  I love homemade Christmases.

In preparation for Christmas Day itself, we started cleaning up the house.  We did a major job on the girls' room, reorganizing, rearranging, and... chucking.

It was tempting to just apply dynamite here.  I wish I had a picture of their room afterwards -- so sparkly clean with a place for everything and everything in its place!

 

Daniel's first Christmas tree!  Do you know how impossible it is to find "Baby's First Christmas" stuff for size 12 mos.?  What about all the babies that are born January to March??

 Popcorn and cranberry strings.  "One for me, one for the tree, two for me, one for the string..."

 Decorating the tree.  Miriam is standing on our kitchen stool which is worth its weight in platinum, it's that well-used around here.  A little neighborhood friend spent a lot of time with us that day, helping decorate the tree while I was in the kitchen baking.  The kids are becoming really good tree decorators, although I think I need to have a talk with them about placing those oh-so-tempting, fragile things out of Joseph's reach...

In past years we've gone to Midnight Mass, but this year we wimped out due to several sleepless nights leading up to Christmas.  We just couldn't handle the thought of staying up until 3am.  However, we do like staying in our jammies as late as possible Christmas Day, so we went to the vigil.  The kids were just tired enough to be mellow for Mass. :)

 Christmas morning!!  As soon as Mr. Pickles and I were able to keep both eyes open at the same time (probably about 2 hours earlier than we wanted to be awake) we all headed downstairs for the present-opening fest, fortifying ourselves with Pulla (it's not Christmas without Pulla!) and coffee on the way.  Santa leaves his presents in front of the hearth, so we headed down there first.

 Every man needs a set of tools. (Mr. P got one too.)

And every princess needs a castle.

 

Yay!  Tactile stimulation!

 Here we are in all our Christmas morning glory.  We didn't get dressed until it was time for dinner (around 3). :)

 Hey, where'd everybody go?

Mmm, monkey rattle.

 Ooh!  Better yet, packaging!  Whee!

 The most popular toy of the year, I think -- a toy dashboard w/steering wheel and all the obnoxious noises a little boy could wish for.  (This picture was cuter when Mr. Pickles was hunched over the toy as well.)

 Santa brought Miriam a mini-muffin baking kit, which she put to good use.  I had to figure out how to quarter a cupcake recipe.

 Putting their new tea set to good use.

In the evening we went to some friends' for dessert, which was just lovely -- plus it prevented that Christmas afternoon blah.  We got to spend time with good friends, and the kids got to show off their favorite new toys.

The week after Christmas I had all these plans for activities and playdates, but as usual I collapsed from post-holiday exhaustion, and buried myself in my new book.  Mr. Pickles had to work a couple days, but he took each of the girls in for a half a day.  It was a nice, low-key week.  We even did a few Christmas crafts.

Miriam, the red-nosed reindeer

 

Merry Christmas from the Pickles!