Christmas 2010

Christmas Morning playing with the new train table

Lucas showing off his new tractor (I accidentally cut it out of the picture)

Adam posing with his rocking Rudolph (he was feeding his ornaments from the tree)

Lucas with his bumble bee Pillow Pet from Santa

Lucas playing with his Mixer while Adam tries to fix it

Adam with his new Mickey Mouse Sleeping Bag

The boys ready to celebrate in their Rudolph shirts

Adam looking adorable next to his stocking

We had a wonderful Christmas this year! I posted a slide show of our entire December of preparations and celebrations. The boys enjoyed opening presents and new stuff of course, and we enjoyed visiting and seeing the joy on their faces.

We had numerous baking days throughout the month and enjoyed our goodies. We celebrated with the Will's the Sunday before Christmas and I got to watch all the kids open their gifts, what a treat for me since the last two years I was chasing Lucas while everyone was opening gifts :) The girls are growing up so quickly into lovely young ladies and Noah is quite the handsome young man, too.

We did our family Christmas on Christmas Eve morning. Andy and I exchanged most of our gifts then too. Andy got a watercolor painting from Lucas and I got new pieces for my nativity set from the boys. Lucas got a camera from us which he is using as a video game player instead of a camera, and Adam got a Clipos table. We had a wonderful relaxing morning.

We celebrated at our house with the Rudolph's on Christmas Eve evening. We opened an abundance of gifts and had a "fancy dinner" as Lucas called it. We had cheese plates, smoked salmon, chilled roasted vegetables, salamis, bread, and canolis for dessert. It was delicious. We watched the snow falling all night long and it was almost magical. The boys stayed up late and enjoyed their time with the family. We finally got them down and then enjoyed some adult time, before Adam decided to wake up from 11 until 3.

Thank goodness, the boys slept in until 7:30. Andy and Lucas got up and promptly came in to tell Adam and I that Santa had eaten all the cookies and milk we left out and Rudolph had eaten his carrot. We headed downstairs to check under the tree and found a train table, pillow pets, snow shovels, and a Alphabet game for Lucas and Wheelies for Adam. Our stockings were overflowing with bath items, toothbrushes, and candy for all 4 of us. The boys played and played all morning, while Andy drank coffee from his new coffee maker and I enjoyed one of my hot chocolate samples. The snow looked beautiful on Christmas morning again making it the perfect day.

On Christmas evening, we celebrated with the Embrey's, including Granny and Gordon Rumble. Lucas confidently kept telling James Gordon that he was not James and that he himself was Lucas James Rudolph. I think Gordon got a real kick out of getting Lucas worked up about having the same name. At the end of the evening as Lucas was saying his goodbyes, he got the best of Gordon when he looked at him and smiled and said, "Good bye, Gordy". We all laughed. Lucas also took some time to show his Great Granny how he plays games on Daddy's iPhone. It was very sweet :)

We all opened our gifts for each other and again the boys loved all their new goodies. Toward the end of the evening the boys started getting a little wild playing chase, spinning, and wearing their shirts on their heads when changing to PJ's. It was wonderful seeing them have such a great time. We let them stay up late again, but our last Christmas present was the boys sleeping through the night until 7:15 for Lucas and 7:45 for Adam. How blessed are we to have such wonderful friends and family to celebrate the holidays with.

Knife Skills

As you all know Lucas can't get enough time in the kitchen, so now when we play Playdoh he is working on cutting it into small pieces. All good chefs have fantastic knife skills. I know this because every season of Top Chef has a Quick Fire Challenge around slicing and dicing different ingredients quickly. I have very poor knife skills and proved it when I had to get stitches from a butter knife. Andy does pretty good. Clearly Lucas has been watching his Dad and Adam is taking after me or Adam is aspiring to be an Asian show cooking chef :)

Baking Day

Dena, Nathan, and Amber came over are we had a "baking day". Lucas was in heaven, being able to help everyone make their goodies. Adam was cranky and not interested, but enjoyed tasting everything. We made peanut butter ball, pumpkin breads, pretzel rods, peanut butter brittle, rock candy, tea rings, rice krispie treats, toffee bars, and the Embrey family tradition tea rings. It's all yummy and we had a great time.

St. Nick's Day

We celebrated St. Nick's Day this weekend. On Sunday, we attended the St. Nick Pancake Breakfast at St. Wendel Church. We enjoyed our pancakes with great friends, the Fishers and the Bretz's. All the kids sat down and ate together, it was almost peaceful. Then we all took turns talking to Santa and getting photos. The boys wouldn't sit on Santa's lap, so we got a family picture. Lucas told Santa he wanted a Bumble Bee Pillow Pet and train table.

St. Nick visited the boys this week and they found a Dr. Suess book, stuff animal and Santa cups in their stockings. We are doing an advent countdown with some new Advent houses, so the boys are anxious to open a door each night and find a treat. We are waiting anxiously for Christmas :)