Büschelmännerhaus: December in Review

24 January 2018

December in Review

We had a wonderful December in preparation for Christmas. It is has been a while that there have been both parents in the house for the whole month of December, and that really made a difference in my stress level!

We got the ball rolling on the evening of December 1st as I took the older three out to pick out special Christmas mugs. There was a complaint or two from the youngest on the next morning, as he wanted the snowman or Santa option, but his siblings had picked out the reindeer for him. Eventually, peace was restored to our morning hot chocolate routine, and John learned a valuable lesson about falling asleep before 6 at night.

That weekend we had kids in 2 parades in the area. Dom and Will rode on the boy scout float in the night parade for Prattville, and Molly rode on the American Heritage Girl float in the Millbrook parade the next afternoon. And John got loads of candy.

We spent Sunday decorating the house in the 70 degree temperatures, which was good, as it turned cold and snowed within 5 days.

Evenings were spent singing carols, playing games, putting together puzzles and watching movies.

This year we added Home Alone 2 to our viewing repetoire. I was opposed initially, but it is a pretty funny movie with a cameo of our current president.

John was enthralled with our downhill skiers. He actually did a good job of not interfering with their journey. They both survived the whole of December, and had we not elected to keep our village up for January, one of them might still be attached to his skis. Ah well...that is what Duco Cement is for!

This year a dream I've had for a few years now became reality. The 5 oldest all took part in our Christmas Card assembly. Will complained the most, but Dom and Molly worked very diligently and it was a pleasant arrangement all around. Even Will's grousing was done with good humor...mostly!

I needed a mug tree to display our cute Christmas mugs. Ridiculously thing to be proud of...but, I am. So it gets a shout out on the blog.

St. Nicholas arrived on December 6th. I think Dom was a bit disappointed he knew exactly what had come for him. But, in all fairness to St. Nicholas, Dom had announced the night before that he really would like a new basketball. Right in hearing distance of Buddy our house elf...Ok, fine, our Elf on a Shelf. Overall, everyone was thrilled with the gifts left by the good saint and all are used frequently to this day. He knows his stuff!

Our tree toppers

Eric doing his best impression of a professor. He loves school.

The week before Christmas was our Christmas Pageant. Dom was Dominic The Donkey. His costume was a bit of a letdown.

I spent the majority of the show attempting to catch the eye of Will who felt it necessary to carry on a conversation with the boy next to him through the ENTIRE production. Except when he saw me looking right at him.

Molly epitomizing the concept that there are not small roles, only small actors. She was a delight to watch and brought a great deal of personality to her small role. Seeing her enthusiasm for singing and the motions probably saved Will from a greater punishment. Which was basically just letting him know I was disappointed in his lack of self-control. For the record, his conversation was entirely on how to make the show more interesting for all of the kids aside from just walking up and sitting down and singing a few songs.

I really enjoy puzzles, but having small children around makes it difficult to do anything bigger than a 250 piece puzzle (which are hard to find, by the way). However, I succeeded in completing a 500 piece puzzle over the course of a week. I had help from all of the children. One memorable time was with Will (He gets a lot of attention in this post, I believe). He would alternate between saying how hard the puzzle was and quoting a Bill Cosby comedy CD that he and Dom were listening to over and over and over again. He needs to work a bit on his delivery, but I laughed none the less.