Christmas!

Merry Christmas! We enjoyed a lovely relaxing day in our own house with just the five of us. No practices to attend/coach, no company for dinner, no schedule to follow. We did our Christmas morning gift opening in about 45 minutes, and then completely melted into the day, each person eating and doing whatever they felt like eating and doing for the rest of the day. That involved lots of cookies and sugar and computer/TV time. I didn't even set foot outside for the entire day! I did toss a beef roast, carrots, and potatoes into our two crock pots in the morning, so we had a divine hearty winter warming dinner on Christmas night.

After church on Christmas Sunday: Dec 21st.

Journal excerpts from Christmas Week:

Sunday, December 21st: Today is the winter solstice, the shortest, darkest day of the year. We lit candles and ate dinner by candle light tonight. I forgot to buy new tall candles for our candlesticks this year, so we used several tea lights in half pint mason jars. It was festive and cozy.

Today was Christmas Sunday at church: my favorite church day of the whole year! I felt the Spirit the most during all of the music. It touched my heart and I felt God's love. Jeff sang in the choir! Amber sang up front with the primary kids! It was sweet. This was Amber's last performance with the primary kids before she graduates into the young women's program in January.

This evening we made up all of the remaining cookie dough (I wanted bake all of it today, but there is still one more batch in the fridge). I made ham and cheesy potatoes for dinner, and it was nice to have that on Christmas Sunday instead of Christmas Day like we used to. We still need to track down some tamales for Christmas Eve. 

We had several bouts at the foosball table today. I played Rose twice, and beat her the first time but then she made a killer comeback to beat me in the second game. I'm ok with losing, but Rose yelled SO LOUDLY in triumph every time she made a goal, my insides were completely frazzled and overwhelmed. I think it affected my playing too. I felt off for hours after that alarmingly loud game of outbursts. 

After dinner, Rose and I played piano cello duets and also violin cello duets with minimal to moderate success. 

Jeff and I watched The Bell of Fraggle Rock tonight to celebrate the solstice. 

Christmas break is in full force! 

Monday, December 22nd: It was 26 degrees and very frosty this morning! That was a shock to the system after all of the mild weather we've been having. We about froze at the swim team's track workout this morning.

We had leftovers for dinner tonight and then played a family card game, had family scripture (in French because it was Jeff's night to be in charge), and sang a Christmas song in French (I est ne le divine enfant). I love my family! I love our small tradition of scripture, song, and game at this time of year. One of the things I put on the kids' to do every day before screens during the break is to play a non screen game with a family member. It was sweet hearing the kids ask each other to play games today.

Tuesday, December 23rd: I chickened out in the 32 degree morning air and did a workout on the elliptical machine instead of running outside. Then I did my 15 minute barn blitz workout: 15 pull-up negatives (5-4-3-2-1), 25 push-ups (in 5 sets), 40 dead bugs (in 2 sets), and 15 TRX pikes. I felt stronger today than I did during this workout last week, and it was super satisfying! Maybe a pull-up is within reach by the time I turn 40!?

After that workout, I showered and went to a friend's birthday lunch at Sakura. Sign that these are my good friends: when I walked into the restaurant, Liz said "Shaina! You're wearing jeans!" Hahaha, she knows that I don't usually like wearing jeans. We had a really fun, good talk and I felt so happy and blessed to have such wonderful strong good people to be my friends. 

When I got home, I checked on my kids in the basement and ended up playing a game of foosball with Rose. I won 10-8. Rose and I agreed that we like playing each other best in our family, because it's a closer more fun game. Rose has improved at foosball quite a lot in the past few days, and I'm so glad! Today she even resisted yelling in triumph every time she scored a goal, and it helped me so much not to have my auditory senses battered and frazzled. 

We had spaghetti for dinner and read most of 3 Nephi 1 for family scripture. Then we sang 2 primary Christmas songs. I managed to play them better than I expected to, which was satisfying and helped me see that I have made improvements on my piano fingering skills this year. I love singing and playing Christmas music with my family!

Wednesday, December 24th: I went on a 4 mile run first thing this morning: my first gift of Christmas! It was only 36° and cloudy, so not horribly cold. My upper body and core are so sore from my barn blitz workout yesterday. At 10am, I went to the track with my family and some kids from the swim team, for a Coach Winger special Christmas Eve 10x 400m workout. (I was moral support-- I didn't run the 400s.) Jeff wore his pink bunny onesie, and I wore my 16 year old homemade fleece Christmas PJ pants. I was surprised and impressed that 11 kids plus our 3 kids came to the workout on Christmas Eve!

Right after we got home, I made rolls and a pan of cheesy potatoes for our White family Christmas Eve lunch. The local family stayed for just under two hours before heading home. After everyone left this afternoon, our family had about 2.5-3 hours of rest and veg time before we heated up our tamales and did our Christmas Eve traditions. Amber loves eating with candles on the table (or maybe she just loves playing with fire), so she lit the tea lights again. After dinner, we read Luke 2, had family prayer, and sang Look A That Star. Then we watched A Muppet Family Christmas and said goodnight at 7:30pm. 

Jeff and I came upstairs from the basement and got to work on Christmas prep. We didn't have much to do, since I wrapped all the presents but one last week. The 2027 year patch that I ordered for Jay's letterman jacket came today, so I got out Jay's jacket gift and sewed it on by hand. Jeff sat by me on the couch to lend moral support while I laboriously poked the needle through the thick wool jacket and patch over and over. It was much easier than the letter patch--mostly because it was smaller. Once that was done, Jeff and I filled the stockings. That's my favorite thing to do on Christmas Eve! I love stuffing Christmas stockings. And this year the stocking stuffers I got actually fit pretty well in the stockings. That's always satisfying! 

Tomorrow is Christmas!!! 

Thursday, December 25th: Merry Christmas! We did stockings and presents at 7am today, and that lasted a little less than an hour. I think everyone was happy with their gifts. Jeff and I have had better years for giving each other gifts, but this year was still ok. He liked the shop vac that I gave him, but he didn't like the shock-tato hot potato game that shocks you when the music ends. I love my ice skates!! I don't know if it's going to freeze enough to use them this winter though! Jeff also gave me a sweet weather tracking device that connects to the system that was already on the roof of our house when we moved in. But he has to exchange the receiver because it ended up being the wrong model. So like I said, we had mixed results with our gifts to each other. But everyone got a fun patterned running outfit (shorts & tank top), which will be fun to wear! 

Jay liked his letterman jacket, and it looks good on him! He is working on tracking down his various pins and mini patches to complete the jacket. The name badge that I ordered will arrive in 2-3 weeks. Then his jacket will be totally finished. Rose is looking forward to going hiking this summer with her new daypack. Both girls got ice skates too, and I really want to go ice skating with them! When Amber opened her bluetooth Shokz open ear headphones, she said "this will make running with music waaay easier!" 

We had a very relaxing day of doing whatever we each felt like. Jay played a computer game. Rose and Amber watched lots of cartoons and then decided to talk and draw and hang out in their bedrooms together for a few hours before dinner. I watched the newly released last two episodes of a darling K drama. I also leisurely played Christmas songs on the piano for a whole hour. No scales or exercises, just a long lineup of half-learned Christmas songs! I also read a lot. It was cozy and Christmas-y sitting in the nook of the couch with the Netflix fire and the Christmas tree glowing nearby, reading a well-written book on Christmas afternoon. 

We had beef pot roast, taters, and carrots for dinner tonight: our annual hunk of beef that I buy once a year. Everyone loved it (except our partial vegetarian Amber), and it felt like the perfect special Christmas dinner.

After dinner, we cleaned up the family room and had family scripture and prayer (Matthew 2:1-12), and sang 3 songs: 1 whole song and 2 partials, with Rose playing Angels we have heard on High for us to sing one verse, and me playing the other two (With Wondering Awe and Silent Night). It was a good end to our Christmas Day. 

Friday, December 26th: Jeff and I went on our anniversary temple date this afternoon. It's always a treat to go to the temple together. We were too maxed out on all of our Christmas foods to want to go out to eat afterwards, so we stopped at Costco for a few things and then came straight home.

Christmas Sunday by our massive tree.

Rose made a thick cheese sauce that gooped all of her ramen noodles into a sticky ball.

Foosball! Jay vs. Amber.

Amber slaved over cleaning her room for weeks, and she and Rose enjoyed the smooth expanse of uncluttered carpet.

Amber and Rose, making snowtop cookies.

Jay, quality controlling the peanut butter blossom cookies that he made.

Candlelight ham dinner, assisted by the very bright glow of our Christmas tree.

Amber brought her crocheting to the track. She ran a mile and then sat down to crochet.

Jeff figured out how to create a copycat version of the fancy $1,000 Vasa swim training machine in the barn for a fraction of the cost using wood, rope, a bungee band, and three pulleys.

Amber used her clean bedroom floor to display all of the organic minerals that she could find in her various informational books.

Coach White, warming up in his Christmas pink bunny onesie.

This was the only picture I got of our White family Christmas Eve lunch. We managed to squeeze the kids' folding table next to the Christmas tree.

The annual reenacting of Luke 2. Jay's favorite part is when the shepherds were sore afraid. Rose's favorite part is quoting the angel. Amber had fun making a baby Jesus out of a soft smiley face ball and a strip of fabric (we don't have any dolls).

Christmas squeeze!

 

I asked Jeff to take a picture of me sewing a patch onto Jay's letterman jacket, and he took close to a dozen. I can see why--apparently difficult sewing brings out all kinds of facial expressions in me, haha.

Stockings stuffed and gifts wrapped. I love this quiet bedtime moment on Christmas Eve: the calm pause before the chaos and celebration of Christmas morning.

Rose built a very architecturally sound wall of cardboard bricks on the stairs for the kids to knock down on Christmas morning. It was so well designed that Amber and Jay could barely get through it! The bricks cascaded down the stairs when Rose busted through, and Jay and Amber had to scramble upstream through the flowing obstacles.

Amber gave Jeff a "make your own power balls" kit, with a sly grin at the fun of giving her dad new balls.

The gift I put the most time and effort into was a big success! Jay loved his letterman jacket! The high school has a vendor that sells letterman jackets with all the patches of your choice already sewn on, but the base price of those is $275, with an additional $20-$40 per patch ($400+ for a finished jacket). I found a blank letterman jacket from a different store at a much better deal and laboriously sewed on the patches myself to save us over $200. 

Amber in a giant gift bag.

Hugs of thanks!

My main gift to Jeff was sadly not a surprise because Amazon shipped it in its own box with a big picture and label on the side. But Jeff was dutifully happy when he opened his new shop vac anyways.

Christmas carnage.

Amber got a very cool camera with built-in thermal printer that prints any picture in black and white on a little roll of receipt paper--you actually tear it off the camera just like a receipt! It's like a polaroid camera, but a fraction of the cost for the paper.

Jay gave Rose a dollar store disco light that was actually pretty fun!

My Mom sent me a box of stick-on foot warmers. They were toasty, but had the slight disadvantage of looking like a maxi pad cut in half and stuck to my foot. I laughed at that! But they completed the illusion of the Netflix fire toasting my toes!

Rose gave us the game Pie Face.

Christmas family selfie!

A sunny December 26th morning.

We came out of the temple at sunset.

Merry Christmas!