The Christmas season started off with some beautiful little voices singing for all to hear. This is our second year to be part of a children's choir & we are loving it. One fun part is that Owen & Anson got to join Eloise in the youngest choir! We started practice in September & began our Christmas tunes right away. In the youngest choir they learn a song then are rewarded by singing a silly one. Due to the boys' constant requests to hear them at home I videotaped one week so I could actually remember the words & motions. I think I could lead that portion of rehearsal now! Owen's absolute favorite song is the boomerang or as he says with much excitement, "booma-ring!!" The motions require pretending to throw a "booma-ring" & show it is spinning then pretending to run & hide. It is perfect for bedtime ; ) That is when he most often makes his requests known & no matter how many times he promises to sit still, he is overcome by the booma-ring flying through the air. Another that we love & that I often sing is the patience song. Patience is a virtue & can often be scant around here. There are more but I will spare you the details yet confirm (if shared) they would be stuck in your head....for-eeee-ver to quote "The Sandlot".
Not a day goes by that we don't hear someone say something that makes us chuckle. The boys deemed that the performance be called the "beh-foremance" which sounds like it could be the performance before the performance. After a quick dress rehearsal Friday night we were ready for the big "beh-formance!"Anson was not excited to go to practice every week which made us nervous he might be less excited to get on stage. He has just about the meanest & most grumpy looking scowl you have ever seen so I was predicting that if he even got on the stage he would stare us down. Thankfully we were pleasantly surprised! He makes us laugh everyday with his trying to figure out if lunch or dinner is next or if it's today or yesterday.....seems simple but he is working on it! On Friday we kept telling Anson that his performance would be tomorrow. He asked a few million times "Is it tomorrow yet?" We would tell him that it wouldn't be tomorrow until after we slept all night & the sun came up again. Partway through Saturday he asked "Is it tomorrow yet?" We tried our best to explain (AGAIN) that it is now the tomorrow we talked about yesterday. He looked perplexed for a few minutes then exclaimed "Is it tomorrow now? Oh no! The beh-formance is tomorrow! I'm not going!" We try to help him understand but on occasion Rob & I answer him in something of the sort...."no buddy, it's yesterday tomorrow now tonight when we eat breakfast before the sun comes up"
Again, it was a feat to get everyone ready & out the door to make it on time so we were shocked we arrived early. We had a slew of family that joined us including Grammy & Papa, Auntie Deb, GGran, Aunt Sandy & cousin Kelly. I think the kids felt very loved! Grammy got a picture of us before the show started. Arlo looks like he fell asleep. He certainly did not do anything that resembled sleeping....Mr. Busybody!
It is a battle to get Charlotte to wear a dress so I let her pick whichever dress she wanted. We looked at dress shoes & she almost melted to the ground when I had her try a pair on. She found these boots instead & I figured they would look great & keep a smile on her little face. Elo on the other hand is so easy...and hilarious. Just the other day Robby told her to get ready to go to Central Market. I was upstairs 10 minutes later & she came out in turquoise exercise shorts, a camo shirt & her Bass Pro hat. I said "Lolo, Daddy told you to get dressed." She looked at me with a straight face & said "I did! I just need to find my shoes!" I reminded her that it was 40 degrees outside & that she looked like she was on a squirrel hunt. I will admit she was adorable though. She did look extremely beautiful all gussied up for her beh-formance! Long story short, Charlotte ended up wearing one of my pairs of tights. After quite the discussion about tights & boots vs. dress shoes I was done. I didn't tell her they were my tights until we were out the door! No time to complain & rip them off right?
I was given the honor of lining up the littlest choir & getting them on stage. I'm glad we practiced five times the night before! While we were waiting in the back of the chapel I glanced at Anson & noticed he was sucking his thumb. I gently reminded him to stop & continued eye-balling the rest of the kids to make sure no mischief was in the making. A minute later I heard a little girl starting to cry. I immediately noticed that a certain little boy had coupled his thumb sucking with twirling the lovely locks of the girl in front of him so much that his fingers got stuck. He had the sweetest look on his face which made it all the more hilarious. I couldn't help but laugh as I got her hair untangled.
When it was our turn we walked down the center aisle, got all lines up & the music began. All three little Valentines did a great job with the singing & the motions. Their favorite song was called "Be a Hilarious Giver" where there is a lot of "hee-hee-hee-ha-ha-ha" sounds. Arlo even joined in on the car jam sessions.
Owen made a scene once we made it to the back of the chapel with his choir. Just to the left of Owen in the picture above is sweet Amelia. Both boys love to play with her but Owen is smitten. He first asked us quietly "Where is Amelia?" I answered that she was with her family but he insisted that she was not & got louder & louder saying things like "I NEED TO TALK TO AMELIA!" & "TAKE ME TO AMELIA NOW!" Oh my goodness, haha! I had to take Arlo & the video camera while Robby escorted the rowdy young lad out of earshot. The video footage of Charlotte's choir was a little bumpy, more like enough to make you nauseous due to chasing a new walking baby & restraining a three year old. Owen was disappointed we never saw the missing Amelia the rest of the evening but I assured him she will be back at choir practice in January.
The performance by the Junior Choir was fantastic. The favorite song chosen by the whole Valentine family was "Go Tell it on the Mountain." We also jammed to it in the car & it happens to be full of Irish flair with a fiddle. Eloise had us in tears on more than one occasion playing her air fiddle like a maniac from her booster seat. Charlotte worked really hard to learn her songs & was so excited to perform. She's grown in confidence so much in the past year. They also sang Come Thou Long Expected Jesus & Jesus Tender Shepherd, both so beautiful.
Fast forward a couple days....we spent the afternoon at the Arboretum then the plan was for Rob & Eloise to drop off the rest of us & go out on a date. She picked a burger joint down the street so casual was the plan or so we thought. I told Eloise to change her shoes so she ran upstairs while I was busy in the kitchen. A few minutes later I started to yell up the stairs to tell her to get a move on when she burst out of her room saying "I can't get this zipped mommy!" She had put on her Christmas outfit complete with a matching headband & bow. I rushed her back into her room to keep it a surprise & when we were ready I announced the arrival of Daddy's date. She walked down the stairs smiling so big while he complimented her again & again. He was in jeans & tennis shoes but decided a wardrobe change was necessary to take such a fancy young lady on a date. I'm sure she was the best dressed girl at the burger place!
We love to get the Christmas décor out the day after Thanksgiving & I was bouncing with excitement to set up our NEW tree. I've mentioned it before but we started with a $29 tree from Target in 2005. We replaced it once in Florida with none other than a $29 tree from Target. We decided that the first year in the new house warranted replacing the scrawny old thing. We got it all set up & lit then I separated the kids individual ornaments into their own baskets so they were aware of how many they could hang. It really was a great idea until one of the boys came around the corner holding two of the four baskets & crashed onto the wood floor sending ornaments everywhere! Thankfully for them, mommy was upstairs & nothing actually broke. That's pretty amazing considering that ornaments usually break when carried a child from my hand to the tree ; ) We should be in good shape this year with carpet below instead of a hard floor.
We ended up with two new ornaments for the year which is super fun. Last year we had a hand painted ornament with a sleigh filled with seven Valentines documenting the year we added Arlo to the bunch. I got back in touch with that same woman & emailed her a picture of our house. She was spot on & I love it!
The other new ornament that is hung far out of reach of little hands is one Bob & Jeannine brought back for us from Poland. It's beautiful & it makes me smile to think about the Polish Valentines.
On Sunday we got movin' on some gingerbread house making. Last year it went flawlessly. This year it did not. The icing wasn't right, I dropped a bag of graham crackers on the floor, we wrapped parchment paper around cardboard to serve as the "foundation" but the tape peeled off & we had to start over with tin foil...and so on & so forth. Once everyone had enough sugar they didn't care about all the frustration in the room
The boys' self control grew leaps & bounds from last year. They were able to last at least 5 minutes longer before attempting to consume the entire house. Really though, they actually did some intentional decorating that they were proud of as did the girls.
Robby gave out awards:
Charlotte- happiest path to the front door
Eloise- gaudiest, just gaudiest
Anson- best kept lawn
Owen- best sun roof
Arlo being the good little boy he is took an extra long afternoon nap providing enough time for me to make another batch of icing after the first disaster. He was really entertained by all the sugar consumption going on around him.
and then it got even better....
Thanks to Owen, the little guy now knows why we like to decorate gingerbread houses! He was so happy after that!
We celebrated our twelfth anniversary on the 18th & it happened to be the coldest day yet of this season. It was below freezing all day which means I didn't want to open the door to let Bella out let alone go outside! We decided to venture out for breakfast at a new place around the corner but after that we stayed put, hot tea in hand & a fire in the fireplace (when deemed safe). We watched our wedding video with the kids that afternoon. Anson referred to it as "your married video" & had lots of comments. Both boys were making us laugh with how many times they said "Daddy, you look handsome. Mommy, you look handsome too!" They loved seeing Daddy's old race car that over time Mommy inadvertently destroyed. With as much siblings picking at each other as can be in a given minute, we had to smile at each other over the pile of kids on the couch between us. How did we get here?
Once we made it home we played the "put them to bed as fast as humanly possible & hurry back downstairs" game. I was the only player this round though because my teammate was preparing a feast to celebrate those 12 years. After visions of sugarplums were dancing through their heads we, by candlelight enjoyed crab cakes, sea bass & the best potato salad I have ever had. Rob has been in chef mode since Thanksgiving (woohoo) & is on a winning streak with fancy date nights in. I'm loving that!
After dinner we had some good laughs watching never before seen footage of me in 2003. We started dating in April of that year, Robby moved to Australia in September & I was apparently on a mission to remind him how silly I was via video. Long before the days of an iPhone, this video was kept safe on a VHS tape. At some point it was converted to DVD & we had no idea it even existed! I was chatty, really silly & most certainly in love. It was great to watch not just for the laughs but also for the snapshot of our relationship at that time. I basically retold our story to him (as if he didn't know) & shared many details I had forgotten about. It's like a video blog, haha! It was a relaxing end to our special day. It concluded like many nights with our saying to one another "goodnight & good luck!" You never know whose side of the bed they will sneak up on first! Actually that's a lie, they always come to my side. My goal by our 13th anniversary is to figure out a way to funnel them to someone else's side. That "someone else" is the guy I'm so thankful for.
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