Sick. Sick. Sick.

Our holiday was turned upside down, almost from the moment school ended.  Bummer.  Three out of the four residents of our house became violently ill just before, during, and after the holiday.   The fourth resident, for the record who shall remain nameless, was extremely cranky, difficult and out of sorts.  Not exactly helping the already difficult situation. 

So our Christmas stunk.  We barely acknowledged it.  If it weren't for that damn fat man in a red suit and his schedule, we may have postponed the entire holiday. 

But when you have an advent calendar and a Christmas chain, you can't really tell the ninos, "Don't worry, Santa will come tomorrow, I promise."  Instead you muddle through.  Some call it hell.  

At least...the sickness (for me) hit just as I finished preparation.  Thank goodness.  It would have been worse to not be done...and helpless.  Last year we almost lost the gifts to the Great Flood of 2013.  There is always reason to be thankful.

Dyleva was very excited about their gifts.  Eva, when she was able, stumbled to the tree and yelled, "There's 100 presents under the tree!!!"  Dylan's first reaction was "Wow!!!"

So for me, still recovering, I am trying to find the good, out of this five day awful ordeal.  In the end I got exactly what I wanted for Christmas, (just under the absolute worst circumstances), open ended time with my family.   

Here are some photos of having fun-preparing for Christmas, before the great epidemic.

Eva's letter to Santa

Hide and Go Seek during tree selection

Olaf

No!  I'm Olaf!





Eva's Christmas tree for her dollhouse

Presents for classmates

Hard at work

My little musician

Caroling bus

Christmas Morning.  I would like to point out
that this area was surrounded by dry-heaving
individuals.

Thank you Tia Linda.

Digger man

 

Coal

So the ninos and I were watching video messages that Santa had sent to them.  At the end, they either light up red, for "naughty," or green, for "good."

Dylan was in a mood, and said he didn't care what color he was, because he didn't want any presents.

Well this comment clearly was unacceptable to his sister.

"Dylan, you better care.  Because do you know what you get if you don't get presents?  Coal.  And then your hands will get all dirty, and you don't want that.  I wouldn't appreciate it.  I wouldn't appreciate getting coal," she explained very passionately. 

"Eva," I asked, "What is coal?"  Wondering where she has heard this from.

"It's a dirty rock Mommy.  I wouldn't appreciate getting it.  Dylan, you want green so you don't get coal."

Dylan still looked as if he didn't care. 

Gingerbread Houses

Every year a tradition in our house is to create gingerbread houses. 


It is like a two week open-ended project.  They sit at the end of our dining room tables like shrines to the holiday. 

Dylan comes home from school, picks a few dulces off, adds some more, we are good for the day. 


This year Eva was excited because she was able to add the Enano to the house.  Dylan created a gingerbread choo-choo. 


I help them with the initial structure, but the frosting seals them almost immediately.  the ninos are on their own after that.  They frost and decorate away. 


It is a daily work in progress that is ever-changing...until about December 28 when Mommy gets tired of looking at the shrines.... 
 
 
 
 

 

Ice and Icing

Dylan has repeatedly asked me to take him ice skating.  We read books where the characters are ice skating.  "Mommy, can we do that?"  I have always wanted to take them, and this weekend we made it a priority.

We decided to make it an adventure.  We would take the train down.  Our incredibly inefficient metro rail which actually added about an hour into our trip.  But, it was the first time Dylan would remember the train.  And he loved it!  He was a little scared at first, but Eva helped him become more comfortable for she has ridden it several times before. 

Our trip was even flavored with some profanity from the locals as a rider expressed her impatience and annoyance to the driver of the train.  It was a great opportunity to show Dyleva the woman making bad choices.

Eventually, we arrived.  It was fantastic!  Dyleva used these little support contraptions to lean on as they skated, and sometimes Mommy grabbed on....I wouldn't say they are ready for the Olympics, but wow!  They had fun! 

Dylan kept falling to the ice, and then he was laughing so hard, he couldn't pull himself up.  He eventually got sick of using the support and pushed it away and skated on his own...for about 5 seconds.

Eva embraced the support.  She was rocking it.  Her skinny little long legs were jetting out in all direction.  With the legs of the support, she looked like a spider, moving across the ice.  

No broken bones or concussions.  A successful outing.

Later, Dyleva was requested to come to Tia Linda's house.  My children are frosting experts, and Tia Linda, well.  She gets a little crazy.  She is kind of an overachiever when it comes to cooking.  She bakes hundreds of cutouts. 

When we arrived, she had a banquet of colored sprinkles and frosting for each child to use.  I'm not quite sure how much actually ended up on the cookies.  By the end of the night, Dyleva had invented several new dishes, such as "Chicken Fingers a la frosting" and "Pizza with sprinkles."  Thank you Tia Linda for spoiling my ninos.  We love you.

Gingerbread Women and Cinderella

Today we made cookies.  Not a lot, because when Eva and Dylan make cookies, most the batter is eaten.  But they had a really good time.  For some reason, Eva has continuously asked me to make gingerbread cookies.  Today, Dylan and I went out to buy all the ingredients.  We went to the store with the choo-choo. (Wegmans)

Eva informed me, before we began, that she wanted to make gingerbread women.  "Mommy, I want them to be girls.  We can put a skirt on them to show it."

I had never considered the sex of the gingerbread cookie until now. 

So we began.  They did really well with the cutouts.  We didn't get to decorating today, because Eva and I had a date.

A development that came together this morning allowed us to secure tickets for Cinderella tonight at Shea's.  (Thank you to Mrs. Koslosky and Tia Mandy). 

Eva and I put on some music.  We picked out our outfits for the show.  We got ready, make-up, heels, perfume.  And out we went. 

I can't tell you about the show, because I was too busy watching Eva.  Her reaction was priceless.

She has been to Elmo Live, and a production of "Clic Clac Moo," but other than that, this was her first theatre experience. 

She was enthralled.  She was cracking up at all the funny parts.  She clapped before anyone else.  It was a long show.  It began at eight and ended around eleven.  But Eva was really into it.  We discussed the plot on the way home, which had a curve ball in it.  Eva noticed the same gaps that I did, I was completely impressed. 

The highlight came at the end however, where Eva got to be photographed with the Fairy Godmother.  Eva asked her, how did you do the magic in the show?"  And the Fairy Godmother looked at her and answered as serious as could be, and said, "Well my dear they had to teach me how to do the magic for Cinderella."