We had to track Santa down at the Fry's grocery store. That's how organized our Christmas was.
Hooray...a post about Christmas, just in time for Spring Break...ha! Maybe one day, I will actually be caught up with this blog! I hope you are all ready for some holiday cheer just as your springtime allergies kick in.
Most families have their own holiday traditions during the month of December. We have a few that we try to keep going every year, but mostly our "family Christmas tradition" is starting to be, "survive December and remember it as a big blur." Blogging about it so long after the fact is just emphasizing the blurriness; in a month where everyone is running from place to place to place, how can I focus on the most important stuff? I will have to look back at the pictures I took and do my best to sift through my memories and commit them to screen.
Some of our holiday happenings have already been blogged about. After two large family vacations in the fall, the Christmas season actually felt less crowded than usual...perhaps because we'd already done so much prep work for our traveling that all the other errand-running felt a little less overwhelming. At any rate, our December remained busy but not breakneck...despite the fact that we gained a new, furry family member that month!
But that story is getting its own blog entry very soon. This post is a list of our notable Christmas activities...
...like buying and decorating our Christmas tree! Yes, we are still using a live tree. Maybe some year Nathan will talk me out of live trees and we will purchase a nice big plastic one, but that day has not yet come. For now, we were happy to bask in the light from our real pine tree, and gratefully inhale its delicious scent.
Now that the girls are getting older, it is getting easier and easier to decorate the tree...I just delegate most of it to them! They still need me to hang the high-up ornaments, but they are slowly learning how to do it all themselves. What a relief for me!
We also spent much of the holidays doing various combinations of playing/listening to music, and looking at lots of beautiful Christmas lights.
First, the music! We were blessed to have a wonderful music-related service opportunity this last December. Occasionally, I play piano on Fridays at an assisted-living center in nearby Green Valley. I am the substitute for the regular pianist, who comes weekly; I have filled in at various times throughout the year. This year, the regular pianist was unavailable for the whole month of December, so I was asked to fill in. I was so excited to go; I love playing for these sweet people; for some of them, it is the highlight of their week! Also, it gave me the excuse to play lots of Christmas carols, which I am more than happy to do.
This year, as luck would have it, the girls had several early-release Fridays in December...so I invited them to come with me, and sing the Christmas carols along with the residents while I accompanied them all! Thankfully, all my girls were eager to do this! Sometimes, I know younger children can be a little nervous around the elderly. My girls have lived near Green Valley (a large retirement community) almost their whole lives, so they are used to being around lots of senior citizens (having a Grandma who lives in Green Valley and has lots of friends there doesn't hurt either!). It warmed my heart to see my girls sitting next to the residents, talking with them, and singing together with them.
Lorelai and Celeste even played some piano songs for them as well! It was the songs they were to play at our Christmas piano recital (more on that in a little bit). They got a great response from the residents. All told, I played Christmas carols for the center on four consecutive Fridays in December, three of which included my awesome daughters! It was a great opportunity and we all felt the warm joy that comes when you brighten someone's day. It may not be the biggest form of service you can give, but we all loved it. Hopefully we will have the chance again this next Christmas.
Usually, our charter school's jazz band holds a Christmas concert. Unfortunately, due to lots of ongoing construction projects, there was no holiday concert this year. Honestly, none of us minded all that much, since it was "one less thing" to worry about in December. But the performing arts class of our school did stage a "holiday musical," featuring quick, fun musical numbers from each elementary school class.
I wasn't able to get a video of any of the musical numbers, but it was a cute show...especially considering that the middle-school students wrote and directed the show themselves! Impressive. Plus there was a lot of fake snow to play in at the end!
It was a lot more fun than Lorelai is making it look here.
Another December musical tradition that did happen was the Christmas recital of my piano students (this is including my two beautiful daughters, plus a couple of former students). Despite being a little stressful, I am always so excited for this concert; I love to hear the kids play their Christmas music, and it was great to hear how hard all the kids had worked and how well they sounded.
I love being a piano teacher, and hope I can do it for at least a few more years!
For those interested, here are the musical numbers that Lorelai and Celeste performed at the recital (I recorded their performances from home, to make them a little less tense during the actual recital):
I was especially proud of Lorelai's performance of "Music of the Night." It was the most lengthy and challenging song she's yet attempted, and she worked really hard on it for a long time. She even played it from memory! She has really come a long way in piano in the last year or so.
Kind of hard to tell in this picture, but there was a harpist sitting under this lovely light cascade, playing soft spiritual music all night for Winterhaven visitors. Beautiful!
Speaking of music, there was a lot of it when we visited the Winterhaven Festival of Lights this last Christmas; we must have gotten lucky and gone on a special night! The renowned Tucson Boys Chorus was there, entertaining everyone with carols.
The girls and I were all quite impressed!
"Muppet Christmas Carol" house...yaaaaay!
"Snowfall" from Elsa's castle
No music here...just a whole lotta lights.
This house has a coordinated light/water fountain show every year. Impressive!
Christmas...pirates??!?!? Okay, then.
Inflatable "Star Wars" figurine house
Camping under a polar bear
There were, of course, many other homes that had Christmas movies or carols playing on loudspeakers, to match their pretty lights.
Listening to music and enjoying the fire
Shooting hockey pucks at the Grinch
The girls got to write letters to Santa.
Going to Winterhaven is probably my favorite Christmas tradition; I am a sentimental sucker, but I never get tired of the lights and the cool displays!
A little closer to home was the famed "Christmas House," which never ceases to amaze us. The house really isn't that big; it's pretty amazing what this family manages to put on display. I shudder to think of what their electric bill must look like.
Not only that, but they have a Christmas tree filled with candy canes that are free to all visitors! The family also accepts donations to local food banks, which I think is a nice touch.
We have slowly started to make the "Christmas house" a tradition in other families as well; we like to bring the girls' friends along for a look!
There is also this impressive "Christmas carnival" house in a smaller neighborhood in north Green Valley:
Sadly, we didn't make it to the Mesa Temple lights this year, because of our newest "family member," but we hope to make it there next Christmas!
Once school was out and all our concerts were done (I'm including our ward's Christmas musical program in with that), we were able to relax a bit, while still taking care of some of our other traditions, like:
--making the kids' annual Christmas-tree ornaments;
--assembling gingerbread houses;
--and baking treats to give away.
For the last couple of years, we have been delivering plates of cookies to our local firemen and policemen. The kids are coming to expect it, and I think it's a great way to give a little service during the holidays.
Another tradition we have come to love is having friends over for Christmas Eve or Christmas day dinner. It's not as grand of a feast as Thanksgiving, but we try to have a nice ham and a few sides. It is a great opportunity to draw closer to people we don't see as much anymore. We have had our friends the Valles over for three straight Christmas dinners now; they were in our old ward before we were moved to a different one, and this is one way in which we try to keep in touch.
However, there was more family than usual visiting from out of town this Christmas; Nathan's brother Evan, his wife Kaela, and Evan's son Braiden all decided to come down for Christmas! We decided to invite the whole crew. And since Grandma wanted everyone at her house for Christmas night, we decided to move our dinner to Christmas Eve. In a lovely coincidence, Christmas Eve and Hanukkah fell on the same night in 2016, so it was a great excuse to make my traditional Hanukkah dinner: pot roast with cranberry sauce, and lots and lots of potato latkes!!
It was a delicious, greasy dinner and everyone ended the evening with full bellies and big smiles. We were so grateful for all the company. After that, it was time to put the kids to bed, and get ready for "Santa's" arrival the next morning...
We were pretty happy with all our gifts!
The maiden voyage of Lorelai's drone didn't go perfectly. At first, it got stuck in our tree. Then, it accidentally landed in our neighbor's yard. It's a work in progress!
Sorry for the bad camera work in the second half of the video...I was laughing too hard at the drone's predicament.
I splurged a little and bought an Instant Pot, a programmable electric pressure cooker that I've been hearing raves about.
It was love at first sight.
I was able to test it out just a day or so later, when I made ham and bean soup out of our leftover Christmas ham. It was delicious; and it was the beginning of a lovely relationship between me and this very handy kitchen device!
So, our Christmas was great as always, and probably a bit more low-key than usual. But that was definitely not a bad thing! Plus, it was our first Christmas with this beautiful girl...
We hope she will be with us for many Christmases to come! The next blog post will be all about her.
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