Bestest Christmas EVER!!!

The past few days have been a whirlwind of activity, it's gone by in the blink of an eye, I'm still trying to catch my breath.

On the 23rd, we went to Brampton in the afternoon to have dinner with the Bonneys and the Leungs at James' parent's house.  The cousins had a great time together, playing with their new toys and trying their best to trash the grandparent's condo.  The boys had fun too.  N gave us and James' parents the apple TV system, so they had fun setting it up, and discussing the benefits to it.  We've got it set up here, and while I can't figure out how to use the damn thing, James and Drew can do it...it is pretty cool!

The next day (Christmas eve) Drew and Hunter opened their last advent surprise in their Lego and "mommy and daddy's" advent calendars.  The Lego one was Santa Claus driving a train engine (just imagine how thrilled Drew was!) and ours was a Christmas book for each of them.  Drew got "David's Christmas" (he had been asking for it all month) and Hunter got "Mouse's first Christmas".  This was the day we had been counting down to all month, as we had plans to go to Nana's and sleepover.  It was all very exciting, and I thought Drew's head was going to pop off from all of the anticipation. 

We decided to allow the boys to open their gifts from us at this point.  We had two reasons for this; 1) we didn't want to lug the gifts to my parents, only to have to bring them back home again.  2)  We were hoping the new gifts would keep them from bugging us every 2 seconds with, "when are we going to Nana's?"...which they had already started in on after the excitement of their advent surprises ran out.

Notice the toilet in the background...Merry Christmas to us!!!  LOL

This cash register is awesome.  It is, however, broken already.  James is attempting to take it back tomorrow.

Thankfully, the gifts kept them entertained for a little while.  James had a little surprise for me on this day.  His parents showed up allowing James to take me out to a movie!  We saw "Little Fockers" and followed it up with some last minute shopping.  As soon as we got home, it was time to pack up the van and head to the Glen.

We spent the evening with my parents, brother, aunt, uncle and three cousins.  It was wonderful.  Drew was thrilled to have his cousins there, and was showing them around, and sharing his toys.  Hunter had a great time following them around.  We ordered Chinese food (WAY too much Chinese food....so much so, that we had it for dinner the next day instead of the turkey and STILL had tons of leftovers!  It was delicious though).

Michael, Drew and Jayden reading some books in the "sleepover" room...as Drew calls it

Hunter and Crystal playing "wii"

A Leapster!  Thanks guys!!!

Once the Archdekin's left, we gathered up all that we thought Santa would want when he payed us a visit.  We had made him peanut butter cookies earlier in the day, we left milk and a few carrots for his reindeer.  I then sat down with Drew and we wrote Santa a note.

"I have been very good...please leave lots of presents....my brother has been good too....he likes trains...."

They had matching jammies, but I did not put H in his until morning in case he barfed on them

Bedtime went fairly smoothly.  A lot better than expected anyways.  James and I read them stories, we put H in his crib and lied with Drew.  H cried for a few minutes, but then drifted off to sleep (it was pretty late by the time we got them into bed)....Drew kept asking for Nana, so once H was asleep (we were all in the same room), James went and got Nana and she lied with us while Drew went to sleep...which didn't take too long, considering his excitement!

Once the boys were asleep, Nana and I headed out to prepare for the morning.  Santa came while we were trying to get everything ready...man, that guy is quick!  ;)

The loot from Santa

James and my dad helped Santa set up the big "wheelie" car thingy that H got, while Nana and I finished wrapping the last of the gifts from her and papa....there were a lot.

H woke up at around 4:30, I'm surprised he lasted that long.  Drew picked up a really bad cough and was coughing all night.  It kept James and I up it was so bad.  Once I heard H, I picked him up and took him out to the living room, where we lied on the couch together and watched TV (and both drifted back to sleep).  Drew woke up at 7, and went straight to the fireplace to see if Santa had come.  He then found me and H on the couch and says, "mommy, mommy, Santa came and left some presents....but I didn't open any because I didn't know which were mine....can I go wake Nana up now??"

Off the little feet went to wake Nana up and then straight to the Santa gifts.  Our rule is that the Santa gifts can be opened with just me and Nana, if need be, but all of the other gifts have to wait until everyone else is up.

When Drew saw the car set, he was confused.  It was unwrapped, and was similar to the one we had given to Michael.  Drew asked if Michael was still at Nana's and when I told him he had gone home, he looked really concerned and told me that he had forgotten his car set.  "No, no, hunny, Santa left it for you"....."REALLY.....ALRIGHT!!!!!!"

Once all of the Santa gifts were opened, Drew went and woke everyone else up, while I put some cinnamon buns in the oven.

We spent the rest of the morning opening gifts and playing with them.  It really was a wonderful experience.  The cinnamon buns were delicious, and once all the gifts were opened, James made us waffles for lunch.

James and Jamie took Happy and Drew out sledding (along with the rest of the neighbourhood.....an annoyance that I will get into in a later post) and once I got H changed, we joined them.  It was SOOOO fun.  Not much snow, but just enough to make you fly down their hills.  Happy was very cute, so very protective of my boys, especially around the other dogs (!?!?!?) that people had brought onto the property.

H had a 3 hour nap this day, which was very impressive for him.  We had left over Chinese food for dinner (which we had kept in the truck over night, there seriously was a truck load of the stuff).  It was delicious, but I don't think any of us want to have Chinese food again for a very, very long time.

Here are some shots from the day;

My brother's hilariously inappropriate gift tags.  James' said, "Merry Christmas, motherfucker"

So Jamie did a scavenger hunt for Drew's gifts.  Drew's first clue was a dog treat.  I WISH I got a photo of Drew's face when he opened it.  He was not impressed.  Totally thought the dog treat was his gift.  The clue was, "she would be HAPPY to receive this"....once Drew caught on, he LOVED following the clues....just had a very rough start.  Honestly thought he was going to punch my brother...or start crying.

So, that's it, another Christmas come and gone.  This was the best one yet.  Drew was SOOO into it.  He's very sad it's over, and is already counting the days until next Christmas.

I should talk about my brother a bit here.  On Christmas eve Drew had a bit of a breakdown.  It was right before the cousins arrived, and he was playing with Jamie.  Suddenly, I heard Drew yelling at my brother and storming into my parents room.  I head into the room and find Drew sitting on the bed.  I ask him what's up and he just starts bawling...."I don't want him to leave, why can't he stay here...etc, etc".  We had a long talk, I ended up in tears too, and I'm not sure I really helped the situation any.  I knew Drew was upset, just did not realize he was that upset.

My brother has accepted a job with the CP rail police, and is heading to Regina, SK on January 9 for training, when he is done the training in May, he will be moving to Golden, BC for who knows how long.  It is very exciting for him, and he will probably have a great time....it's just hard to see someone you love  move so far away.

That night after the boys had gone to bed, Jamie had me listen to the gift he had made for Drew.  It was one of the recordable books from Hallmark.  Of course, I ended up in tears after listening to it.  Drew LOVES it,  mostly because Jamie calls one of the characters dumb in it....we have to listen to that part over and over again.  It's a wonderful gift, my parents did one too, and they will be listened to alot this winter, I'm sure.

With all the excitement of Christmas, Drew seemed to have forgotten his anger towards Uncle Jamie, until it was time for us to leave.  I told him to go give Uncle Jamie a hug, and instead of hugging him, he starts yelling at him, telling him to never buy him gifts ever again.  I was appalled.  I was embarrassed, I had no idea where that was coming from. They had such a great day, he loved the gifts Jamie had got for him, WTF???

The next morning, Drew comes to me and says, "mommy, I don't want Uncle Jamie to buy me anymore gifts.  If he doesn't have to buy me anything, he doesn't need a job, and he won't have to go away anymore"

My heart broke in half at that moment.  The poor little man, it's so hard to understand.

Needless to say, there is a wee bit of stress around our houses, as we try and help Jamie get ready to go...and try to get our heads around him leaving. 

I will say though, it was the best Christmas day we've had as a family yet.  In Christmas' past, we've spent the day driving to various places, spending a few hours here and there at different relatives.  While it was nice to see everyone, Drew (H was just a baby last year) never really got a chance to play with any of his gifts and we never really got a chance to relax.  Spending the whole day at the Glen was perfect, I'm so glad we decided to do it that way this year.  Hopefully, it will become tradition.

Merry Christmas!