Hailie. The birthday girl.

Today we went to my niece Hailie’s 3rd birthday party. It was a lot of fun. The boys had a great time it was held at Air Zone, it is a children’s play center that has jumping castles and a ball pit. The Kids ran around like the crazy people they are and pigged out on food.

Cam on a see-saw.

But being at a birthday party in December made me think of my own birthday as a kid. Being born in December is the worst. I know a lot of people complain about when their birthday is but December really does suck. If you try to have a party a lot of people don’t want to come for three reasons.

1. The weather can get nasty and so they don’t want to drive in it.
2. They don’t want to buy a gift. They are already spending enough on Christmas presents.
3. They have other places to be. Christmas parties, family get togethers.That sort of thing.

Nate climbing the big air slide. My fearless wonder.

It always made it hard to really enjoy my birthday. I guess that’s why I liked the family parties the best. They had to show up and the food was better then the cheap pizza they give you at the kids party places.

So if you get invited to a December birthday party and dread going remember they can’t do anything about when they were born and please try to be nice. 🙂

I don’t know why. There is no real reason for it. But this year I just can’t seem to get in to the Christmas spirit. I have tried Christmas shopping but I just can’t seem to get excited by all the glitter and ribbons. Don’t get me wrong I LOVE Christmas. All the food and time with family….. and the presents. 🙂 But this year I am just not interested in the shopping. I am feeling a lot more well…. cheap then previous years. I just can’t bring myself to buy a bunch of stuff that people don’t need and if they wanted it they would have gotten it themselves already. So what then??? I thought about making gifts but there is only so much time that I can spend on crafts without a little helper and it isn’t enough to get much done. I could do gift cards but they just seem tacky to me (but I am not complaining I still love getting them). So I am back at square 1. What do I get people? When ever I spend time thinking about this it just irritates me and makes me cranky so…I gave up. Well….Okay….I took a break and instead turned my attention to something I knew I would enjoy thinking about more. FOOD! I step away from gift planning and instead planned the menu for Christmas day.And here it is so far at least.

Breakfast:
– Fruity French Toast Bake
– Bacon and sausage
– Oatmeal (for Len and Nate)

Dinner:
– Turkey (this it is a must in my house)
– Homemade stuffing
– Home made cranberry sauce
– Canned cranberry jelly
– Roasted vegetables
– Baked turnip
– Fresh bread
– Potatoes (I am not sure what kind yet)

Dessert:
– Homemade Apple Pie
– Birthday cake (for Jesus)

The best part is I get to enjoy all of this wonderful food and the only part I will cook is breakfast, turkey and cranberry sauce. The rest will be prepared and brought by family. We share all the work to try and make the day more relaxing for all. It is such a great time.

So stepping away from the gift giving and focusing on something else has really helped to bring the joy of the season back to me.

Now what to do about all of that gift shopping?

Nate is still having problems with stooling. So the surgeon has decided to redo his botox again and see if that helps. He will be going in on December 21st for the injections. I am hopeful that it works and helps to make him more comfortable. For those that don’t know. Nate will have 4 injections in the muscle around his sphincter. The injections are suppose to help to relax the muscles and allow him to have bowel movements on his own so that he won’t become backed up. The last few weeks he has been backing up a lot. This evening he was very bloated and backed up and became sick to his stomach. It is so hard to watch him and to know that he must be uncomfortable but he is such a little trooper that he doesn’t complain at all. I think he is afraid to complain of the pain because he is afraid of the remedy. In order to relieve the pressure we have to clean him out. This is done using laxatives and suppositories and is not at all a comfortable process for him.

So I am hoping and praying that the botox will allow him to feel better and be a semi normal 3 year old again.

Do you remember those bouncy balls that are in vending machines. People around my age I am sure had a few at some point in their childhood. Well that was todays advent surprise. I know not that exciting but wait….there’s a twist…. It was actually a make your own….do it yourself….bouncy ball kit. The other day while wandering the dollar store I saw this “make your own bouncy ball kit”. I stared at it for a few minutes wondering what had to be done to make it? But there were no instructions on the box. It said it only took ten minutes to make. I debated back and forth on weather or not I should get it for the boys and finally decided why not. I was only a $1.25 and they could make it with Daddy. So tonight they opened up door 5 to find a note that said “Look where the pots go.” and off they went in search of their prize. At first when Rob saw it he snubbed his nose at it and wasn’t interested but I told him to do it any way. After just a minute or two all three boys were huddled around creating their wonderful little project with big grins on their faces. Rob sat puzzling over how exactly their ball would form out of this powder that had come in the kit. It was so much fun to watch them enjoy this time.

Here is their creation.