This has been the most fun Christmas season yet. At first when Laura was a newborn, I remember thinking how much more stressful Christmas was than before we had a baby. But now that the kids are getting to the fun toddler age, and we have gained a little more experience, it just gets more enjoyable every year.
It has been raining for days in a row here, and so there have been worms all over the drive way. One morning when we were loading the kids and all the stuff into the van, Laura saw two worms all wrapped together. She said very matter of fact, "Look, those two worms are fighting." I'm not exactly sure that is what they were doing! Observations of a four year old.
Matt posted this Laura conversation on FB this week. She is such a riot.
Another good Laura story. Matt bought the girls the Elf on a Shelf this year. Laura is completely into it. She looks for Mr. Johnny (her elf's name) every morning, and she plays games on the website. Well she started to get concerned that Johnny would report that she was bad, and so she started to prepare a sign. She colored on this sign that she had started at daycare. It was her hand that made a Thanksgiving turkey, and she drew snow and rain all around it. When she completed it, she announced to Matt that she wanted to put it on a stick and put it in the yard. She wanted Santa to know where she lived and that she was good. Matt told her that it would get all wet in the rain, but Laura was adamant about it. So Matt took it the next to work and had it laminated. He brought it home and stapled it to a wood post, and they put it in the flower bed in the front of the house. She feels much better now.
Whenever Matt and I are busy with something, we tell Laura that she has to go play, we are working. Well, this backfired on me the other day. Laura was doing something I didn't want her to do; I don't even remember what it was now. But she was frustrated that I was telling her to stop, so she yelled at me, "Mom go do some work!" Whoops.
Hannah is developing in leaps and bounds. She seems to be growing rapidly right now, and she has started to show interest in using the little potty. Whenever Laura goes potty, Hannah toddles after her and sits on her little potty. Last week she actually had a few successes. She was pretty excited about it, but she has not been consistent. It's still early. She is talking so much more now too. She repeats just about everything anybody says. She loves to name everyone in the room. Her teacher says at school that she likes to name all of her friends. She is not a vegetable fan. One night we thought she was saying "yucky bubbles" and she was really saying "vegetables." But usually she spits out vegetables that she tastes and then says yucky. She also loves Ariel, Dora and the movie Rio. She sings "rio, rio!" And she quotes Swiper on Dora, "Oh Man!"
Last weekend we kicked off our Christmas preparation by going to cut our tree. We went to Saum's tree farm again in Amanda. They had a little pen of goats this year for kids to pet. That was Hannah's favorite part. We did that first, and when we went to pick our tree out, Hannah just kept saying, "goat. goat" and pointing towards them. Laura was the leader in picking out our tree. She showed us the ones she liked and said that we picked the perfect tree. She also picked out a tree for Uncle Alan. Matt and Alan were disappointed that Josh didn't come along since they had to lay on the ground and cut the trees! Too funny! Then we went inside and the kids had hot cocoa and a cookie. And to top of the day, Laura got to sit on Santa's lap. She was super excited about this. She told him a bunch of stuff that she wanted and everything started with "brand new." Hannah didn't want anything to do with the big man, except that she took a candy cane from Mrs. Claus. It was a great trip!
Of course when we got home, the real fun began. Matt wanted to rearrange the living room first before bringing in the tree. This is pretty typical; he's usually itching for a furniture change around Christmastime. Anyway, once we finished rearranging, Matt brought the tree inside and commenced an epic battle with the tree and the tree stand. I recall these same battles between my dad and Christmas trees past. Many years it seems we had twine string or some other support measures holding our tree up straight. Laura was trying so hard to be patient the whole time. She asked several times, "Can we decorate the tree yet?" Finally we started to decorate the tree. Laura and I did the bulk of it. Laura loved every minute. It was like a treasure hunt looking through the boxes of decorations and finding ornaments. Hannah "helped" too. She dragged garland all over the floor and took off as many ornaments as Laura put on the tree. But we had fun, and it looks great! We have the living room decorated, but we haven't done the basement yet. Usually we put up an artificial tree, Buckeyes themed, a train set, and a village set. The kids are enjoying opening a door every morning on our Advent calendar. It's a house that sits on our mantle. They didn't really get it last year, but Laura loves it this year. And Hannah wants to do it too, since big sissy is doing it.
We had another meaningful event this week. Grandpa Prochaska passed away on Tuesday. He had been sick for awhile, but he was tough and feisty. I have many happy memories of him and the Prochaska Christmas around this time of year. When we were little, we always celebrated Christmas Eve at their house. We would all take a drive and look at lights, while Santa came to Grandma and Grandpa's house. When we got back, the living room was full of gifts and we commenced the opening. As kids, we were so excited while we were on that drive "looking at lights." Grandpa always led the passing out of the gifts. He would start with stocking stuffers, like socks or gloves or lotions. The passing out was the fun part. He sat down by the tree and would yell your name and say from Santa Claus and toss it to you. So there were all kinds of things being tossed through the room. It went something like this, "Marie, Santy Claus! Ellen, Santy Claus! James, Santy Claus! Joe, Santy Claus!" We loved it. My husband thought it was the best thing when he joined our family and came to his first Christmas party. There are many more memories like this. As I spoke to my cousin Joe, this week on the phone, we recollected that we are so blessed to be in our thirties and have had so much time with our grandfather. Of course he will be missed, but we know that he is in a better place.
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