Christmas Morning

The boys slept until 7:30am. I had the alarm set for 8am just in case. We were heading off to Omaha at 10 am to have Christmas with Lisa and her family. Chase ran downstairs to the fireplace to check their stockings. Chase was so excited that Santa filled both of his stockings. I didn't feel like wrapping his socks, so they got put in his stocking.

Santa got really smart this year, thanks to the advice of her Grandma. I bought huge gift sacks and put the Santa gifts inside. So I didn't have to wrap and less to clean up! Chase got Lincoln Logs and art supplies. Anthony got a driving game and dinosaurs.

I made breakfast and then we all got ready and headed off to Omaha. Lisa made a ham and her husband Sanchez made tamales. I made my first French Silk pie. Can we say rich and sweet! It was good, but you could only a handle a small piece. I made the mistake of not holding back one or two gifts to bring to Lisa's. The boys each had one gift to open, and Lisa bought them clothes. Chase liked his jacket, but Anthony wanted a toy!
Lessons Learned this Christmas:

1. Celebrating Christmas six times in four days is too much.
2. I love our families, but they can come to Iowa next year!
3. Besides celebrating Christ's birth, seeing the excitement in the boys eye's, makes it all worth it.
4. Believe in the Magic.
   
5. Making Christmas cookies the weekend after Christmas is a lot of fun.
6. A $3 woopie cushion can bring more laughter and happiness than a $30 gift.
   

Christmas Eve

Monday morning I had to work for about 30 minutes. Payroll had to be processed if we wanted paychecks on Friday. I needed to run the interface, but I couldn't get connected to work. So I ended up going into work to take care of it.

Miranda and Rob were there, so they stayed with the boys while I went to work and then grocery shopping and Christmas shopping. I still had three gifts that needed to be bought. I really need to shop on-line next year!

I got home around 2pm. I started food preparation for Christmas Eve. Stephanie and her family were coming over and Miranda and Rob were coming back after visiting her dad. Chase wanted to play his new game Sorry. So I decided that playing with him was more important than having the food done right on time. It worked out great. Stephanie and her mom got to our house around 6pm and they helped me finish preparing the food. We had cheese dip, meatballs and wieners, veggie platter, cheese and crackers, avocado salsa dip, cream cheese with hot pepper jelly and Stephanie made her famous taco dip and Stephanie's mom made a trifle with custard she brought from England.

The kids had a great night. Besides opening presents from Stephanie and her family, they had presents from Miranda and Rob. Meagan and Jesse sent presents and Eric's mom's best friend Mary sent gifts for the boys. Chase and Anthony received pirate and sheriff dress up stuff from Stephanie. Chase opted to be the Sheriff of Lacona Ave. Our evening of celebration wrapped up around 11pm. The boys were exhausted. They totally forgot to put out cookies and milk for Santa.

Christmas with my Dad and Judy

Sunday morning my dad and Judy came over to Justin's, so we could celebrate Christmas with them. It is a tradition in Milwaukee to have hot ham and rolls on Sunday morning for breakfast/lunch. I remember from a young age on stopping to get ham and rolls after church every Sunday. The Italian deli's, bakery's and mom and pop stores sell it. The ham is thinly sliced and warmed in pineapple juice and the rolls are freshly baked with a hard outside and soft in the inside.

So for breakfast Sunday morning, my dad brought ham and rolls. Eric doesn't understand this crazy tradition, especially since he isn't a fan of ham. So, he just eats the rolls with butter. Chase was happy to see Grandma and Grandpa. Anthony hasn't seen my dad enough to know that it is Grandpa, and so he hasn't really warmed up to him yet. He did like the fact that he got a Go Diego Go boat from them though!

We stayed at my brother's until 11am and then headed to Grandma and Grandpa Gruenwald's. My dad went over there too. I called Grandma to tell her we were coming. She said, "This isn't the best time, the Packer game is on." I only get to see my dad's parents three or four times a year! I didn't take it to heart, and we still showed up. Luckily the Packer's were having their worst game to date against the Bears, so she didn't miss a lot!

We stayed almost two hours. Both of my grandparents are not in good health. Last Christmas Grandma told me it would be her last Christmas. Well, we made it one more year! So, it is hard to leave, knowing it could be the last time I see them alive.

We got on the road at 1:30pm. We were ten miles outside of Milwaukee and the snow hit, along with the blowing winds and ice. It normally takes an hour to get to Madison. It took us over two hours. We kept passing car after car in the ditch. We kept forging on. Eric had to work Christmas Eve, and he was bound and determined to be there. After four hours of being in the car, and we were still in Wisconsin, we found a Wal-Mart. It was dark and the boys were trying to be good travellers, so we gave in and bought new DVD players for the car. The last one's only lasted six months. So we decided I would go back to entertaining the kids. Well, I was exhausted come Sunday afternoon, I had a headache and our slow progress towards home was just too much. My grandparents had given the boys money for Christmas. It was going to be put in their savings account, bu alas we used it to buy them traveling entertainment! My Grandma and Grandpa Gruenwald had given the boys $10 each, so Anthony bought a DVD with six cartoons on it and Chase bought a Spiderman watch. We then got back on the road. At the five hour mark we hit the Iowa border. The roads got a little better in Iowa, but it still took us another four hours to get home. So what is normally 5 1/2 to 6 hour trip was a 9 1/2 hour trip.

Christmas with my Family

Chase and Anthony really love their cousins Madilyn and Hanna. They opened their gifts and played and played. There was little fighting and a lot of loving. My mom had an open house for our side of the family. My side of the family was celebrating Christmas on Christmas Day, but since we weren't going to be there, she invited my aunts, cousins and some of our close friends over on Saturday, so we could have a chance to visit.

My mom had a great spread of ham and rolls, fruit platter, veggie platter, shrimp salad, potato salad, and meatballs. Later that night my brother invited us over to his house to hang out and sleep over. The boys enjoyed getting to play with toys they don't have! Hanna has a kitchen, and Anthony thought that was great.

How Many Christmas' Can One Have In Four Days?

We headed to Milwaukee after work on Friday, December 21st. The fog had rolled in earlier in the day. The Des Moines airport was shut down, due to fog and there was a big pile up on I-235. Eric took us a back way, and we were able to get around it. We made it to Iowa City, when we heard that I-80 West of Newton was now closed because of the fog. We headed North up to Hwy 151 and took that into WI. The fog was with us the whole way to Milwaukee. We still made it in six hours, but is was very stressful on Eric.

We got to bed by 1am and I and the kids were up by 8am. My girlfriend Sara and her now Fiance' Brian ( I am so excited, he proposed last Saturday!) were coming over to my mom's to celebrate Christmas with us. Chase and Anthony were happy to see her, but they couldn't think of eating breakfast before they got to open their gifts! Chase is very interested in the earth and knowing where other countries are. So Sara got him a really good size globe with topography on it as well. Anthony's favorite present was his Spongebob football, which he carried around all day. Most of the pictures taken with him, have the football too! Sara and Brian headed out late morning, which gave us an hour or so until my grandparents were arriving.