And So I Don't Forget...

December 2019, Part 2

December 23rd, Christmas Eve eve, Milly and I were picked up by friends for Carols by Candlelight, rehearsal night. The queue in was long, but the kids ran and played together while we waited.

Just as I was about to sit down inside, I got a very special FaceTime call. Jenna, Darren and my brand new, hour old nephew Rudy. While we did quickly feast on cheese and biscuits before taking the kids to the bouncy castle and other entertainments out the back, the Carols were pretty overshadowed for me. 

Mike picked Milly and I up out the front and we headed to the hospital to meet baby Rudy. Darren's parents, sister and partner, all over from Adelaide, and my parents all ended up there too, conveniently in the large delivery room as they awaited room transfer. It was such a joyous atmosphere, complete with a shared celebratory bottle of champagne, as we all met and cuddled Rudy. Milly was pretty enchanted, even if she didn't want to hold Rudy, and I'm so appreciative of the brand new parents (and rest of the families) who still made a lovely fuss on Milly. 

On Christmas Eve those same friends, Nicole, Paul and April, came over for a swim in the pool and dinner. Thankfully, because I was in no way organised even though I knew they were coming and this is our second year running doing this, they bought all the fixings for chicken rolls. I had left over cheesecake and icecream to offer for dessert.

Mike worked Christmas Eve night (and Christmas night too) so when they said goodbye they wished me luck, corralling two overtired girls and a long to do list to get ready for Christmas Day. We laid out Santa sacks, juice and biscuits for Santa, a carrot for the reindeer, and read some Christmas books before bed. The girls actually went to bed better than I'd hoped, Milly pretending to snore to be asleep for Santa, but I finally finished my homemade cheesecake and cleaning after 1am.  

Christmas morning Milly came into our room saying 'I'm so excited!' When she saw her makeup table from the balcony she headed downstairs, sitting at the table and putting on the pretend lipstick and doing her nails with the pretend nail polish. Loved it. You could tell she was noticeably faster opening her presents this year, even putting her head fully into the Santa sack to make sure she had got every one. Emma didn’t even finish opening all her Santa presents on Christmas Day. She saw the car and that was it for Emma. That was the big one. She kept going back and climbing into it all morning. When I asked Milly what her favourite present was though, "None. I like all of them.”

There were the 9 of us for lunch - my parents, Mike's parents and his brother. We ate outside in the courtyard. I loved the sense of community, of family, with everyone pitching in to get things ready and carry them out and get set up. It was a bit hot out there though, so we didn’t really linger.

Mike gave me a heavy boxing bag and a cordless post digger, (with an additional present still yet to arrive.) He joked that I have my first power tool. During the morning Dad pointed to the unwrapped presents and asked me if they were mine. 'Yep'. Really, he asked to confirm. Because he'd been kidding. 

After saying goodbye to Mike, then our guests, the girls and I headed to the hospital to visit Jenna, Darren and Rudy. It was Emma's first time meeting Rudy and she was fascinated. 'Little baby' she said as she pointed to him. Milly sat on the bed with Jenna, carefully looking after her own baby.  

My MIL Julie had asked Milly what Jenna's baby's name was. "Rudy the red nosed reindeer", answered Milly. 

Home again, I called Milly down to dinner. "I'm just putting on my makeup!” The girls got dressed into their new pajamas, a gift from Jenna and Darren to match baby Rudy's outfit. New Christmas tradition here I think. And after I'd put Emma into bed, Milly and I built their fridge, a new Christmas toy.

And Boxing Day was spent with Mike's family, at my brother- and sister-in-laws' house. There was presents, feasting and remote control car racing on my nephew's new ramp.

All 4 kids sat down together at the kid’s table for lunch. It's so interesting watching the dynamic between the older 3, as Milly is definitely relaxed around them and more outgoing (standing up for herself when required) than I often get to see. It was just a lovely, relaxed day. 

Driving home, Milly commented about the car loaded with presents, "It's strong, like you Daddy.” She actually reasoned out that the presents were the reason we drove in Mike's car, instead of my smaller one. The girls really were lucky kids!.

And that was Christmas 2019. 

Driving to Carols on the 23rd, I'd commented that I wasn't ready for Christmas to be over, which it felt like it almost already was. (Nicole agreed, feeling the same.) But those last few days were wonderful and enough. 

A lovely, full crazy December.

December 2019, Part 1

Well, 2019 was pretty dismal on the blogging front, but maybe I can do better for 2020!? I hope so. There are so many great snippets of my life recorded here over the years.

Anyway, here was our December. In a mass of photos.  

On December 1st the girls each received an advent calendar and Christmas box, filled with some Christmas books, outfit, crafts and an ornament. Although I did started this tradition for the girls last year too, the personalised boxes are new and I love them. L O V E love them. Milly's disappeared upstairs under her bed (notably away from Emma) so I'll need to reclaim to put away for next year soon. 

We celebrated one year living in this house with cake. Milly tells me her favourite thing about 'new house' is the pool. Mike and I both love it here, although acknowledge there are certain elements of this house and property that will just get easier and easier as the kids get older.

We also attempted to take a family photo. Emphasis on the attempted. 

We picked a 3 metre Christmas tree from a local Christmas tree farm. Milly helped decorate (and supervise), although I never did work out why the decorations needed to go in her toy microwave before they could go on the tree. Emma spent the month randomly taking decorations off the tree. And when I convinced Milly to let me take her photo as she played on the couch, we had to take a similar photo of her baby too. 

We had a crazy wonderful day when the girls and I headed into the city with friends (Nicole, Paul, Grace, Caitlin and April) in the morning, before going to a festival in the evening with Mike and other friends (Ben, Esther and Annabelle). We visited Santa, saw the Myer Christmas windows and the gingerbread village and posted Milly's letter to Santa.

The Santa letter was A Big Deal this year. As we are getting ready to leave, walking to the car, Milly gasps, ‘My letter!” She’d forgotten her Christmas letter that she had written a few weeks earlier. I hadn’t even thought to bring it. She’d stored it carefully in my office and knew exactly where the letter was. Walking up the stairs to the car, Milly tells me, ‘It’s so important. If Santa doesn’t get my letter, I wont get the presents that I want.” I asked her if I could take a photo of her and her letter. ‘No. Too important!” And she told me she had been working on it very hard.

Milly had been wanting to see Santa earlier, but faced with the opportunity she suddenly wasn’t keen. Nicole and I coaxed her into it, with mention of her letter. She got it out of the pram and held it carefully. We placed Emma on Santa’s lap, which she didn’t love but we took photos and removed before any screaming. Milly stood next to Santa, with me there too. Holding her letter, I asked if she wanted to give her letter to Santa but she wasn’t keen. I don’t think she uttered a single word! Santa suggested that putting it in his official mail box might be a good idea.

As I watched Milly ride the carousel on her own, with her hair pulled back in a ponytail, I wondered where my little girl had gone! And Emma, she LOVES jumping castles. Each time - I think she went on 4 times - she wouldn't get off voluntarily and the ride operator helped her off.  

I took the girls to the Wiggles Concert in the city, which was an absolute challenge. I think I inadvertently got Emma hyped up on sugar. A wriggly kid at the best of times, my goodness she did not pause for a moment! 

Santa came down our street on a fire truck. He had a little chat with Milly, (and she actually talked to him) and gave her a lollipop. Afterwards, she told my Dad and I that Santa was very nice, but she'd already known that. 

Milly, Mum and I attended an Australian Ballet performance of The Nutcracker. When I’d seen an ad for this, I had tickets booked within about 10 minutes, including inviting Mum to join us. Aimed at 3 year olds and older, it was probably a little beyond Milly's concentration as she was a wiggle little thing. I found it stunning though, and I'm not sure I’ve ever seen ballet preformed before. I was surprised how many Nutcracker songs I recognised, although quite possible the entirety on my classical music knowledge ended up being Nutcracker songs. Milly said her favourite character was the Sugar Plum Fairy, wearing a sparkly purple dress, and I wonder if she wasn’t disappointed there weren’t more tutus. After the performance we headed into the city for a little shopping, showing Nanna the Myer windows and dinner, before catching the train back home. 

Milly and I baked biscuits that were later decorated with a very pregnant Aunty Jenna. I think this is the third year running for this particular Jenna/Milly tradition. 

We celebrated Emma turning 1 and a half with half a cake. Poor kiddo wasn't herself in the lead up to Christmas, sick with a virus that put her off food and bedtime. Not the best timing for us parents either! This adorable girl definitely deserves her own post to share more, but I will say her language is exploding right now. She has started saying the cutest 'tank too' and sings the Baby Shark song to herself. 

Milly finished her year of 3 year old kinder with a party and little performance. I volunteered in her classroom that final day, helping set up their feast, and man, it makes me happy to see the person she is growing into. She's so loved kinder this year, and although she is a little nervous about 'big girl kinder' in 2020, I know she will again thrive. The bag she received, which included her portfolio of work for the year, also had a little painted reindeer tree ornament which I adore. It's the start of kid ornaments which makes my heart happy.

Milly also had her end of year ballet performance. She has been taking ballet classes for a few terms now, after I found a class that is focused on little kids and is laid back and fun. The end of year performance is really just like a normal class, in their regular room at their regular time, but with guests, applause and medal given out at the end. Both grandmothers, Mike and I were all able to watch our little ballerina.

There was Christmas crafting and an evening excursion to see Christmas lights. With two young kids their bedtime is actually before sunset, but we still managed to make a couple of stops. 

Mike was unfortunately working, but the girls and I attended Wood family Christmas (with Dad's family) at my parents' house. Emma actually napped for most of it - down before people arrived and still sleeping when some left - but both girls were very lucky with presents. Milly's 'best friend' Ellie was there, my youngest cousin who Milly has taken a great shine too.

And this is the point I stop for part 2, after realising this post is already incredibly long. 

Merry Christmas

It's been a lovely festive season here, but over way too quickly. Christmas Day was full of family and presents and food, while Boxing Day was lovely and quiet at home with just the three of us. Mike was actually working Christmas morning so we held off on exchanging our presents till the next day. Even Santa delivered Christmas night; apparently he's happy to help out shift workers like that.

From my family to yours, wishing you a wonderful Christmas and a safe and happy 2018! 

xx

December Daily 2016: Days 2 - 4

Wow, it has been a busy month! Mid December I decided to put working on my December Daily album on hold to prevent myself from feeling completely bonkers, and blogging was even further down my to do list. I did get the first week of my December Daily pretty much finished, with photos taken and stories recorded for the rest of the month. It's a big project at the busiest time of the year, but gosh I love it!

December 2 - I knew I didn't want to get too far into the month without a photo of Milly so we had a little impromptu photo shoot with a Santa hat and Christmas t-shirt. 

December 3 - Milly and I went to a market with our friend Esther. I didn't actually take any photos so I cut up business cards and brochure that I picked up. 

December 4 - An afternoon tea for my brother-in-law's birthday, with Milly's first real look at a Christmas tree. I love the reflection of my niece and I in the ornaments, a surprisingly good photo for a 4 year old. :)  

Merry Christmas, from my family to yours

7 Sleeps Till Christmas

I have a raging case of the December busys. I've been fairly good at noting down the stories I intend to tell in my December Daily each day, (I haven't written out the journaling as well as I'd like) but there hasn't been time to create pages.

Mike and I did production line invitations to a pre-baby celebration we're holding at our house in January - we've nicknamed it our Baby Warming and it's in lieu of a more traditional female-only baby shower - and I've made a batch of Christmas cards in the last couple days. Note to self: don't hold off making Christmas cards till December just so you can include them in your December Daily album. Writing and posting them in December is more than enough to warrant a page in the album!

Last Friday we went to a local Carols by Candlelight with Peta and cutie niece and nephew. There were free helium balloons, face painting, bubbles, even Ana and Elsa. We didn't quite make the fireworks - even I had to head home to put my very tired boy to bed - but we're definitely planning to attend a Carols by Candlelight again next year.

On Saturday we met Nicole and Paul's brand new precious baby girl. I'd given Nicole a phone call on Friday afternoon, just a check in to say hello, and apparently timed it perfectly between a bout of contractions! We had a quick chat - she was 7cm dilated! - and at 10pm she called to share the good news. With the hospital only 10 minutes from our house (it will be my hospital too, so nicely convenient) Mike was pretty impressed I'd managed to wait to visit until I met him there in the afternoon, after he finished work. I've known Nicole for over 20 years - we were 8 when we both moved to Melbourne and were placed in the same class in school - and it's incredible to think our kids, less than 3 months apart in age, might have that same relationship.

On Sunday morning I attended cutie niece's ballet concert. An hour of 2, 3 and 4 year olds ballet dancing; it was very sweet and funny. Apart from a moment's distraction by the trap door when she walked on stage, she did well - smiling and and following the teacher's direction.

Continuing on what seems to be tradition of a major December project (because we like to make life difficult for ourselves) we hired a carpenter friend to build two built-in benches in our outdoor area. Definitely in improvement in functionality and appearance, we're really pleased with how they turned out. Mike is currently applying the second of three coats of varnish.

Tuesday and Wednesday evenings this week were taken up by our final prenatal classes. The Complications class wasn't as daunting as we'd thought, but learning about a typical newborn routine of feed, play, sleep - repeated every 3 hours - has us going 'oh, wow!' There was an Obstetrician appointment in there too (Chip and I are both going well) and all gave us a chance to visit with Nicole in hospital again.

Last night Mike and I went to Doncaster shopping centre and powered through our present list. Just a couple presents remaining now. We had intended for Mike to meet me in the city after work but Melbourne is in the midst of some super hot days and air conditioning seemed the way to go.

Tomorrow is expected to be the worst of it - they're predicting 41 degrees (that's 106 Fahrenheit) - so I'm planning of hunkering down at home with air conditioning, cold drinks and Christmas movies, wrapping present and working on my December Daily. I think there might be some biscuit baking in the evening too.

Oh, Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells

Jingle all the way

Christmas in Australia

On a scorching summer's day

Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells

Christmas time is beaut

Oh what fun it is to ride

In a rusty Holden Ute

 

30 Before Marriage: Christmas Completions

Christmas year before last my sister put in a present request, as she often does. (Helpful; I'm not complaining.) A set of two stools, like the photo she provided, differing heights fine. Mike obliged, with one stool ready in time for our family Christmas celebration and the second following a couple months later. Jenna was rapt and Mike was pretty proud of them too.     

There was one goal that was ticked off without trying, forgotten down at the bottom of the list. (A last minute exchange, replacing 'visit a new-to-me market' I think.) There may not be as much twinkle as I had originally envisaged, but those lights still greeted me every December late night home. Love the twinkle. 

20. Give someone a handmade present.

30. Decorate the front yard with fairy lights for Christmas.  

18 goals complete, 12 goals remaining. 

Merry Christmas!

After arriving back home smack bang into mid December, I've been struggling to locate my Christmas spirit this year. It just hasn't really felt like Christmas; I can't believe it's Christmas Eve already!

But the presents are purchased and wrapped, the tree decorated, my December Daily started, Christmas cards sent, chocolate brownies baked and a ham is in fridge ready for glazing.

I'm sitting outside in the sunshine with my friend Nicole, picnicing as we wait for the gates to open for one of my favourite Christmas traditions, Carols by Candlelight. After the hectic pace of December, this is the moment I stop - too late to complete anything else now - sing and just enjoy.

This is the moment my Christmas really begins. And if Carols by Candlelight doesn't fill me with festive spirit, nothing will. ;)

Wishing you and your loved ones a safe and happy festive season; may all your Christmas hopes and dreams come true.

December Daily: the Stories of Days 1 - 5

1 - We met Mickey and Minnie at Animal Kingdom, surprising ourselves by loving the experience and being a touch star struck. We rode the Everest Expedition rollercoaster three times before leaving from Hollywood Studios where we finished the day watching the Fantasmic light and water show.

2 - Christmas lights make me joyful, and the Osbourne Family Dancing Light Spectacular at Hollywood Studios has to be some of the most amazing of all. Love, love, loved it.

3 - After spending the day at the Kennedy Space Centre, we returned to Downtown Disney where we started our Christmas shopping, and bought sn item or two for ourselves.

4 - After a much needed sleep in - theme parks are exhausting! - we spent the day at Universal Studios, riding all the rides and getting drenched in the process. A favourite, Hogwarts Castle and Hogsmeade, where we couldn't pass up having some Butterbeer.

 

5 - Walking through Harry Potter's Diagon Alley with my wand from Ollivander's and waving it to cast spells - turning on lights, making it rain, turning a canary's feet into hairy claws. Sometimes it's wonderful to shed cynicism and disbelief to just enjoy the magic and wonder.

Twas the Night before Christmas

The table is set, the tablecloth has even been ironed. The groceries are purchased and a turkey waits in the fridge.  The last present has been wrapped and placed under the tree. The lights are twinkling and Carols by Candlelight plays on TV. 

Soon I'll snuggle up on the couch and fall asleep under the light of the Christmas tree, waiting for Mike to get home from work very early on Christmas morning. If I manage to wake, we'll even exchange a 3am present or two.   

Wishing you and your loved ones a safe, happy and very Merry Christmas.