Lots of other words also come to mind...but I think I can fit them all into those categories. The feelings that the memories produce are what I picture as magical. Not pull rabbits out of a hat magical, but the feeling that you might get when seeing that for the first time ever. I don't mean to compare the miraculous event of Christ's birth with magic, but more the feeling of the word magical.
Maybe another example....last year when Ellie and Mason were playing with their LaLa Loopies Mason wasn't treating her toy lifelike and Ellie said to Mason, "She doesn't know she's a toy. She thinks she's a real girl!" There is magic in that.
Hopefully your Christmas season is still magical and of course, miraculous and you just get what I mean. Anyway, that is how the season is for me and hopefully you will get that from reading.
We started our season as we traditionally do, picking out a tree the Saturday after Thanksgiving. This year we didn't go far and it didn't take long. In less than thirty minutes we drove to the tree lot, picked out our tree, and had it back to our house for trimming. (The tree was dead in less than two weeks, so next year we may need a new plan. I knew in the first week when it stopped drinking water and the smell changed that we were in trouble. ) We had a great time singing Christmas songs on our short ride. Our tree was beautiful and Ellie loved it so much she wanted to hug it. (It was still soft and alive then. :D)
I think getting our tree is the first of the magical feelings. Year after year we continue our traditions and although some years they are executed better than others, they are still ours and wonderful. Kevin puts the lights on the tree while Ellie and I get the house decorations out. Ellie assembles the Nativity as I place things around the house. Ellie dances in the tree skirt and gets all of the Christmas chocolates on a tray. Of course the lights are a BIG job so Kevin continues dedicated to perfecting the placement of each bulb as Ellie and I go about the rest.
As Ellie gets older, she gets more and more personality. Not entirely related to this video, but just as I think of it she is getting quick on pointing out irony and puns, she is also getting quick with sarcasm and jokes. She makes us laugh and I'm often surprised by how quick and bright she is with every day conversation.
This year, Kevin and I had just returned from Las Vegas with a Gangnam Style shirt for Ellie. So towards the end of the night there was an extra dance as Ellie showed us her Gangnam Style dance moves.
I had once told Kevin that after all of the lights are on the tree I like to squint so the lights are a bit of a blur and look at the tree. So once Kevin was done this year he tried his to get his squint on.
The next morning our elf, Chip, returned to our house. He first arrived in Ellie's room under her tree as he had in previous years.
He is a bit magical, but this year also a bit mischievous. After arriving in Ellie's room, he was found many other places throughout the month. He turned our milk green, flew Kevin's helicopter into the tree, fished in the tub, rode our train, got wrapped up in twine and got himself stuck between the window and the screen - among other things.
Santa also sent an elf to Mason this year. She named him Chip Jr and called him CJ. It was fun for the girls to talk about their elves and I assume it was fun for the elves to discuss the girls as well!
But back to our tree. Because the lights and the rest of the house usually take us an entire night, we decorate the tree the next day or so. We didn't get the train out last year, but decided we should this year. Ellie remembered that in prior years she had put her smaller stuffed animals on the train. Ellie loves our traditions and so didn't want to go without doing it again! I love love love this about Ellie.
Ah...the finished tree. It was as beautiful as any tree really can be. I loved it so much and was only sad that it died so quickly.
On to our next tree....We learned from last year that we needed to get our Angel from the Angel tree earlier this year, but thanks to our endless search last year, we knew the spot to go. So that week after school we ran over and picked out a name. I often feel year to year my posts around certain months and events are the same as they were the year before. The Angel tree, for example, is one of my favorite things we do as a family. I love that Ellie always wants to pick a child her same gender and age. I love that we get to pick things that Ellie would love. In fact this year we bought her Angel the exact same winter coat Ellie had. We were able to find everything on her list and get it back to the drop off location a few days later. It's a small opportunity to give, and each year the story may be the same, but I'm thankful for it and hope that Ellie always remembers to give and to find joy (and magic) in giving during Christmas.
All season, we stuffed as much in as we could and celebrated and spend time with family and friends. I took Ellie to see A Christmas Carol for her first time. I was a bit worried that some of it may be a bit dark for her, but luckily for me a few things worked in my favor. Firstly, we went to see it in Orem with Sage, Taj and Leea who have all seen it before, whose family owns the theater, and of course were super excited. Secondly, Ellie's friend Clare from school played the part of the Ghost of Christmas Past. So with Taj and Claire both intimately familiar and in love with the play, Ellie was set to enjoy. And that we did. She loved the play and was excited to not only be with Taj, but to see Claire and we also ran into her teacher, Mrs. Nielsen.
The next night day was actually December 1st so Ellie's advent calenda
That night we went to dinner and to see Zoo Lights at Hogle Zoo with the Vanderlinden family. We LOVE these girls. They each have their own personality and Ellie does really well with every single one of them.
Kimese had a pre-light craft for the girls. They used their hands and feet to make reindeer shirts, which they all wore over their coats. Ellie did NOT want to wear hers over her coat. She was not happy about the way it looked and I really can't blame her, but I made her wear it anyway. It was easy to find the girls and Kimese had gone to such an effort to include Ellie. Ellie loves the shirt, she just doesn't love it over her coat, but has worn it several times since as an over-sized night shirt.
But look how stinking cute they all were with their over-sized shirts and their special 3D glasses. As a side-note the glasses transformed each point of light into either a reindeer, a snowman or a snowflake. They were pretty awesome and free with our entrance!
Also included in our visit to the lights was a visit to see Santa. I love this Santa - although he never gets Ellie's name right - but he takes his time to sit and really visit with each child. He asked Ellie about school and what she wanted for Christmas and also what her favorite zoo animal was. When she answered it was a monkey he talked about a specific orangutan at the zoo and didn't rush her off his bench.
After we visited Santa the girls ran around the zoo like they owned it trying to stay warm and see all of the lights. We made a pit stop to ride the carousel and then at the end of the night Kevin, Ellie and I made a pit stop for some hot chocolate.
Grams had us over to make our traditional faux gingerbread houses. They were....well....art? If nothing else, they were memorable and delicious!
Of course in December along with the other reoccurring posts - we have the piano recital and the school program to brag about. For the piano recital Ellie was a little nervous to get started, but then picked up perfectly half way through her performance. We still love her teacher and push forward at an Ellie pace at the piano. ( An Ellie pace means, we do it with as much practice as I remember to enforce as there is no way she is going to do it on her own.)
In the school programs I am always impressed by their diversity in the program. The recite poems, they sing in rounds, they sing with the piano, they sing a cappella, they dance and have animation in most songs, and they do it all from memory. Like I said, impressive.
This happened to be one of my favorite of the program. Probably because it looked like the song the kids enjoyed the most and sadly, my camera memory ran out part way through!
Mid- month exactly - on December 15th we had the Heath family Christmas party at our house. It is always super stressful to me to have that many people in my house. I think we counted over 60! Ellie gets super excited to have that many people at our house and asked all day long how many more minutes until people started coming.
In December, I still tried to have Ellie keep her room clean. We tried everything from asking nicely, to chore charts, to nagging, to bribery. One day Ellie said, "My room is always so messy, but I am not a chores person, but I need money." Another day she said, "I don't like cleaning up." I said, "But your room is always so messy." She said, "It looks good in my room." At that point I just had to laugh. She basically said, I make this mess look good!
When Santa came to the Heath family Christmas party he said to Ellie, "I noticed that you're doing good in school." She said, "Thank you." He then said, "Remember to keep your room clean!" She said, "Okay." He said, "Merry Christmas."
There was slight improvement on the cleanliness of her room, but nothing spectacular past Christmas.
(Since I am writing months later, I can give the update that I have given up since then. I ignore, for the most part, the messy room. I just don't look down the hall. After having time off in December from school and enjoying life to the fullest - our larger battle became homework. Homework was honestly a struggle every night and entirely too painful for all of us. Ellie has decided that responsibility and growing older isn't always that fun. You will see more of this in future posts.)
Kevin asked Ellie what she wanted most for Christmas this year...after some internal debate & some "from who" questions she finally decided, "I want Mason to come early for Christmas."
A few weeks before Christmas Ellie and I were talking and she said, "On no, we are going to have another bad Christmas." I asked her why and stated that we've never had a bad Christmas. She then explained, "Because we aren't going to get any snow!" I am pleased to announce that we not only had an amazing Christmas, but we also had snow on Christmas Eve. It was about as magical as it gets.
When I asked Ellie what she remembered most about Christmas, she said it was watching the movie Christmas Oranges with Grandma on Christmas Eve.
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