christmas 2007 retrospective: the big day
after almost five hours of sleep i woke up surrounded by chip, eve and ruth. all in our double bed. after some half-hearted attempts, i gave up trying to go back to sleep. so instead i stared at chip, i stared at eve and i stared at ruth. i nudged and whispered but no one was budging. so with the darkness and silence of brooklyn outside, the glow of the tree in our little place, i got up, wandered a bit and started playing with the gift chip and i got for each other. an amazing camera is a fun thing to have when you're anxiously waiting for your family to wake up christmas morning.
about two and a half hours later the girls started rustling, which possibly had something to do with the countless pictures i was snapping inches from their faces, and ruthie was the first to get a cheery "merry christmas!" whisper and kiss from me, with eve and chip following shortly after. eve's daily question of "it's christmas time today?" was finally answered with a yes and when asked if we should go into the family room to see if santa came ruth gave a very strong, panicked "NO! no santa a my house." so we stopped mentioning his name and after about 10 minutes ruth was ready to leave the bedroom with eve close by her side.
last year we over did christmas. even with my handy rhyme and limited gifts, i think we did it this year too. the stockings, which are so fun to pack full of great little gifts, kept the girls busy and entertained for a long time. i think we could have stopped it all there. but, after a bowl of lucky charms and apple jacks for the girls and grapefruit for chip and i, we went to work opening the rest of the gifts. all the gifts from chip and i were wrapped in white paper and tied with fabric ribbons only. maybe a little obsessive, but i loved it.
the girls unwrapping their gifts was perfect. ruthie would immediately flip the gift over, find the seam and tear like crazy. eve, after having untied or cut the ribbon, would carefully unfold the edges and then proceed to unwrap or tear as gently as possible until the gift was revealed.
hits: the blocks, hello kitty camera (after it finally charged after a billion hours) the planet earth series, the saute (thank you s&e), and the magic wands. along with every gift from grandparents.
misses: the bicycle riding duck, from santa to ruthie. she's terrified of it. thanks a lot santa.
after playing with all the gifts for awhile i hurried to the kitchen, pulled the strata from the fridge, stuck it in the oven and got to work on preparing and baking the cranberry coffee cake. then off we walked to the beans. christmas with the beans is always so great. and fattening. alysha had baked like crazy, so altogether we had eight (more?) different treats/dishes to choose from. between five adults and three kids we ate almost all of it and then sat around talking, laughing, napping, playing and taking pictures.
after hours of lounging at the beans we made our way over to the nelsons and their homey brownstone. more chatting, eating and laughing. once the girls couldn't take it anymore we made our way home. as chip and i cleaned up they watched a show. ruth fell asleep almost instantly after lying down on the rug. eve was not far behind and neither were we. i fell asleep to the oddly soothing sound of jamaican style christmas music and chip's heavy breathing. merry christmas, brooklyn.
next up: the final installment so i can be free: christmas 2007 retrospective: the wrap up.
Tuesday, January 15, 2008 at 05:31PM
Reader Comments (5)
Dan and I just both grinned and got all warm in our heart when we found your blog WE LOVE YOU GUYS!!! You are beautiful people. XOXOXOXOOXOXOX a million times.
why does food always sound like the best part of anything to me??? i'm glad the hello kitty camera was a hit, and i'm amused that the duck riding a bike wasn't. when you put it that way - "a duck riding a bike" - it can sound scary.
ok, love the jammies, love the cereal tradition being carried out by you also, all the pictures are so wonderful, and I need your strata and cranberry coffee cake recipes!!
I think we just might need to spend next year with you guys. Although you might enjoy waking up to us laying next to your Christmas tree.
oh yeah, and the pictures are gorgeous. Nice camera!