Merry Christmas!!

For your listening pleasure as you read, sounds of I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas...baby style.



Well, this Christmas was much different than last...yes...MUCH DIFFERENT. Last Christmas, we were celebrating Christmas by hugging a toilet (most of us anyway). No food, no family gatherings, no tearing apart gifts, no food staying in the stomach (oops..probably too much info).

This Christmas, God heard all my pleas for a normal Christmas celebration without illness. Good to know God cares about even the little things. So we'll call this Zoe's first Christmas seeing as though she was one who was sick last year. Ahh the joys of Christmas at the Daniel household. Our Christmas usually pans out as follows:

Christmas Eve: Mom's family comes over for dinner and fellowship. We usually conclude the night with the Christmas eve church service and gift opening. Among the gifts that Zoe opened that night were a Noah's Ark stuffed boat (complete with Noah and a few animals inside) and some clothes from her Aunt Jan, a stuffed Winnie the Pooh from her Great Grandmother, and a snowman doll that wiggles while he sings (compliments of Darin and his great win during the Dirty Santa gift exchange). The best gift of all for the night? A bow and a box. Who knew???







Christmas Day: Shift gears and go visit Dad's side of the family for Christmas day lunch and gift opening. And the days following the festivities are filled with shopping and using $$ and gift cards, as well as stuffing our faces with left overs (especially the desserty left overs..those are my favorite). Though knowing I was pregnant and would easily put on those lovely pounds that would have to be shed following baby #2's birth, I watched very carefully how much of those desserty leftovers I stuffed. Gifts today include a couple of dolls from her Aunt Julie and some friends of mine, more clothes, lots of books from her Great Granny, a set of Veggie Tales DVD's from her Uncle Paul, and various other gifts like a V-Smile Baby and some blocks from her Grandma, and some cars, and a shape sorter box. This kid loaded up...literally! Although I still think she would have been happy just with that bow and box from the night before!

My husband's way of showing his Christmas belly - which he's having to force out to match mine.






And, this year had another special surprise. An acorn. Oh yes, lovely acorns. Falling from trees, scattering along the paths on the ground, finding their way underneath pregnant women's feet as they walk causing them to fall and hear a "snap" in her foot as she hit the ground with such a graceful thud. Oh...acorns. So that was the picture perfect ending of my Christmas Day. Walking to my car with my family to go to another gathering when all of a sudden, I hit the ground. I had stepped on one of those lovely little acorns, rolled my foot, and heard a snap in the foot as I went down. Being me, stubborn me, I got up, brushed tears from my eyes and continued walking, or rather limping now, to the car. About to drive off, Darin stopped me and reminded me of my stubborn ways and asked if I needed ice. "No", I replied..but as I took my shoe and sock off, what revealed was a different story. Already swollen and turning blue. Broken??? Torn ligament??? Just a sprain??? Who knew...but definitely painful. After ice and an ace bandage, we resumed on our journey. By day 3, I went and rummaged through the garage for some old crutches that I used when I tore a ligament in high school. Old and crumbly as they were, they kept pressure off my foot and allowed me the freedom to move a little faster than I was moving before. I knew it was something beyond a sprain. The bruising even today encompasses my entire left half of my foot from mid foot over and from my toes to my heel. Come to find out today, there's no break! Just a bad sprain and torn ligament. It will heal on its own with time and patience. It's already feeling better. Whew..just what I needed, entering into my third trimester with crutches and wearing a cast for who knows how long. Talk about an over exaggerated waddle. The doc actually thought it was broken when he saw the initial point of pain, so it's a great thing it's not cracked. Again...God cares about the little things. Oh, and no pictures or videos of that injury. I didn't exactly want to reenact that snap, crackle pop.

And last but definitely not least, the real reason for our celebrations...celebrating Jesus's birthday with a "Happy Birthday Jesus" cake. This will be something Darin and I will contine with our children even before any of the festivities my family. Since we're not planning on doing the Santa thing, we're trying to come up with some things that we can do along the lines of the story of the birth of Jesus. One of those things obviously is the cake. The other we've decided on (thanks to a mention of this in Amber's blog) is the whole three gift idea per child..representing the whole idea of three gifts being brought by the three wisemen). What a great lead in to the Christmas story. Then we'll also share the true story of St. Nicholas with them. I'm sure as the years pass, we'll develop many more traditions..these are just our first ones.