Christmas Was Here

This was one of our more exciting Christmases in years. Not only was it Lillian’s first Christmas, but it was also the first Christmas where the magic was back. Ella, being the ripe old age of three, is now able to comprehend some of the Christmas fun. Santa, Christmas cookies, presents, Christmas lights, trees, stockings and getting to go to church to see friends, eat fish crackers and blow bubbles (church is admittedly awesome when you’re three.) It was also the first year I felt a little stress about Christmas traditions. Now that Ella was getting into the holiday spirit, we needed to figure out how we were going to do things. What we start now will most likely continue through the years. We wanted to make sure we were starting some memorable traditions without going overboard so that each year would be stressful. There is more to plan than I’d even anticipated and even more props go out to mom, who made Christmas magical every year. We decided that Santa would bring stocking stuffers and a gift, but we would supply the rest. Santa was good with that idea, less to carry in the sleigh. We lined up the pajama elf to come on Christmas Eve night to lay out a new pair of pajamas in everyone’s bed for the night. We made Christmas cookies, drank hot chocolate, played outside, drove around to look at lights and had our annual dinner out. (Dinner out and Christmas light peeping was slightly interrupted by one Lillian who decided to break out in an angry diaper rash between her last diaper change and the restaurant. She went from being happy and bubbly one minute to screaming and inconsolable the next…we had to exit the restaurant quickly, and loudly.) One Christmas Eve tradition we hope to not repeat is spending time at Children’s Hospital. We decided the 24th was a good time to get Lillian’s blood draw done. We figured we were both available and they wouldn’t be too busy in the lab. We were right! Lily was a little trooper, it only took them two attempts to get her blood drawn. Now we can verify that she also has the hemoglobin variant, Park Ridge, like Ella and isn’t also ingesting high amounts of lead. Loran gave me a hard time for having Lily’s blood drawn on Christmas Eve, but we both agreed, we were blessed to be able to leave Children’s Hospital that day with only having a blood draw. We prayed for those families who would be spending their Christmas in the hospital with their babies and children.
As if celebrating our own magic wasn’t enough, we had the added magic of five other Christmas celebrations and a wonderful little Christmas program put on by Ella’s school. Oh yeah, don’t forget, Ella’s birthday is the 20th. She is now in Christmas withdrawal, wondering where all of the gifts and celebration went.
Ella’s school program was just adorable. What’s not to love when you have 21 little children between the ages of three and six dressed in their finest singing songs with actions and added sign language. We’d been prepped before by her teachers that they had an Ella exit plan. Basically, they knew from their experience that the youngest participants often have a slight meltdown at the sight of so many people staring at them. One teacher would be stationed near Ella in case of said meltdown. We were also prepped to be prepared that she probably wouldn’t sing. Now, I know for other parents, this would be devastating and potentially embarrassing to not have your child sing at the program, or cry throughout it. However, given my small child experience and the fact that I know Ella, I was not phased by the idea of her not singing. I knew that if we escaped the night without her vomiting, we would have been successful!

Well, the night was successful. Ella did not vomit and did not cry during the performance. The plan was that I would meet Loran there as he would be coming from work. So I was in charge of getting the girls fed, dressed and there on time. Even though I started the process 1.5 hours before we had to walk out the door, we were almost late. The program was not at Ella’s school, but at the school district’s early childhood building because they have a larger multi-purpose room. Ella’s had school there prior and it is Lily’s current school, but upon entering the building, then seeing her teachers and friends, Ella was completely thrown off and started crying. I was working hard to comfort her, balance my camera bag and Lillian and knew the whole time that Loran and the rest of our family was only 30 feet away, but they couldn’t see the carnage to step in and help. Needless to say, I didn’t enter the program in the most cool-headed fashion. I didn’t get my video camera set up on the tripod and I wasn’t in the holiday spirit. Then those little children started singing, Ella sat and watched them the entire time, legs spread eagle, and even tapped her rhythm sticks a few times. After the program, the children handed our their gifts to the parents and we were all treated to a buffet of snacks. The children then ran around like wild animals, which after a bit of watching, Ella participated in. And with that, Christmas break began and the celebrations were in full swing!

 

   

Both girls really enjoyed Christmas, being with family and of course, gifts. Especially unwrapping. Didn’t matter whose gift it was, if it needed unwrapping, there were two little girls willing to help. And one willing to eat any evidence that it had ever been wrapped festively! Loran has proclaimed that when he’s president, there will be a jobs bill in which people who are unemployed can be hired to unpackage children’s toys at Christmas. There is nothing more patience trying than attempting to free a toy from its plastic clamshell, twist tie, taped confines while a small child urgently dances in front of you, pawing at said experiment in patience. Our first Christmas morning in our new home, Lillian’s first Christmas, dressed in new pajama’s, fire in the fireplace, baked oatmeal for breakfast. It was bliss, despite a couple of preschool tantrums…

 

 

And of course, we went over the river and through the woods to several Grandmother’s houses this year…

 

It’s always a little crazy with the Straight side…much laughter and good stories, though this holiday we managed to escape without lighting a single firework/explosive. That's almost shameful. 

 

The Redmann side is always busy when 25+ family members pile in. With Dice Game craziness, good food and the newest little family members!

   

Christmas with Nana, Papa and Nathan featured a camera lens change, outfit change for Lily so she could move freely and a new dollhouse!

 

 

Christmas with Grandma, Grandpa and Aunt Chelsey involved a personalized message from Santa, a sick Aunt Chelsey and fun presents to climb and stand on…and Chinese food, there’s always Chinese food, and a yule log on TV.

 

 

And yet again, we loaded up the entire family into the rental mini van and made our way across the frozen Wisconsin tundra to visit Great Grandpa and Grandma Gutt. We arrive with much noise, confusion and baggage – enjoy some time together reading, wrestling and photoing and less than twenty-four hours later, silence falls upon the house again as we load up and move out. Lillian doesn’t like driving as much as Ella. FYI.

As we wrap up 2010 and welcome 2011, we thank you for reading and following our adventures. Our life isn’t always clean and tidy. There are messes to deal with, scrapes to mend and falls to climb up from (as I typed this, child #1 fell off the toilet). I try to be real, to be open and to be honest. Parenting isn’t for the faint of heart, neither is marriage or life in general. There are always going to be ups and downs. I try to publish both. For our family, as a remembrance of our life in general, not just the smiles. But also for our readers. We aren’t perfect, we do the best we can with what we have. I thank each one of you for taking the time to read our silly little part of the world wide web. If you can believe it (haha) Loran set up some analytics for this blog and every week I get a report on how many individual people are reading, how long they’re staying on the site, how many other pages they’re going to and what cities they’re from. I’m humbled to see that we have hundreds of friends not only across the United States, but you visit us from across the globe. I even see some of you check while on vacation overseas! In fact, the day Lillian was born – you all topped the charts with 278 visits Saturday and 114 visits Sunday!!

Stats 2010 from Loran:
6,817 Visits from 905 Unique Visitors
19 Unique Countries (US = 6,698, Brazil = 43, Canada = 23, Italy = 19, UK = 10, New Zealand = 5, Germany = 3, Hong Kong/Russia/UAE = 2)
1:11 Average Time on Site
174 Visits from Search Engines (common search words = ellatimes (121), ellatimes blogspot (32), little gutt (2))
243 Visits from Mobile Devices (common devices = iPhone (119), Android (78), Blackberry (28), iPad (11), iPod Touch (7))
Most Popular Re-Read Posts Once Off Homepage:
    1. The First Week of Being Four
    2. While We Wait
    3. Lillian Caroline’s Birth Story
    4. The Party Don’t Stop
    5. The Call
 I hope you’ll find time in 2011 to smile, laugh, love and be loved. From our computer to yours, The Gutt Family