It's a Christmas miracle! It is only three days after Christmas and I am already posting about it!
Ok, where do I start? Our Christmas was awesome this year. I can't believe everything we have done in the last five days. Exhausting, but totally worth it. I guess it makes the most sense to break it into three parts, "This American Life" style, since we essentially had three Christmases.
Act. I: Christmas Eve/Yadao Family Christmas
Being a child of divorce, I have always found the holiday schedule impossible challenging. You need to make sure you spend the appropriate amount of time with each parent, not to mention extended family, etc. It does not get any easier when you get married and add a whole additional family to the mix. Don't get me wrong, it is amazing to have so much family so close. However, it can add stress to an already stressful time. Our usual Christmas Eve tradition was to go to church, then rush over to Yadao family Christmas (my Dad's side), then rush to my Grandma's house for Ladendorf family Christmas (my Mom's side). This year was different, since Grandma is gone now, and there was no Ladendorf family Christmas. Sad, but the silver lining was we were in less of a rush and more able to be in the moment.
Girlfriend made out like a bandit. I was a little shocked at how showered in gifts she was. She unwrapped like it was 1999.
Elliot and Daddy ready for church
Elliot and Poppy
Matching Auntie Debi
Fammelsbergs
Let the present-opening madness begin!
Look Daddy, I got another book!!
Girlfriend with her loot.
Elliot trying to give cousin Lola a kiss.
Act II: Christmas Day
In keeping with tradition, on Christmas day we go over to my Mom's house. We usually plan for a little later in the morning because my brother, defying all stereotypes of children on Christmas morning, is notorious for sleeping in super late on Christmas and we, the adults, sit around waiting for him to wake up. So while we were waiting for that, we did Christmas morning at our house. It was a short affair, since we didn't see much of a point in going all out on presents for a 6 month old. She is not going to remember and has a pretty short attention span. We can get her to open about 4 presents before she gets sick of it. But, there were a handful of presents there and our little family sat around the tree, opening them up and taking tons of pictures. Baby's first Christmas is well documented folks. The pictures below are merely a sample of what we got. I will say, and no offense to our extended families, with whom we had a marvelous time over the holiday, but this short, intimate time with just my immediate family was probably my favorite part of Christmas. We were in our pajamas, soaking in the togetherness. Elliot was in a great mood, comfortable in her own home, and not over-stimulated by anything.
Everything goes straight to the mouth...
Like I mentioned before, later in the morning we went to Mom's...
Girlfriend opened her favorite toy of the year...her remote control. We can't go anywhere without it. And the songs don't get old at all.
Cuddling with Grandma Gail
While we were there it snowed!
Playing with her new remote
Ok, so we seem to be running into the same problem over and over again; hats just do not fit our baby. Conclusion: All producers of baby hats do not know how to design for a real baby and are tailoring their designs to those magazine babies. But, Jessica, weren't you frequently mocked by friends and loved ones for having such a large head in proportion to your body as a child and don't people constantly tell you how much your daughter looks like you? Irrelevant. Moving on...
Act III: Pullman
For the final leg of our Christmas journey, we went up to Pullman for a few days to celebrate Christmas with Erik's family. As always, it was a lovely affair, full of laughter, wine, and lots of good food. As you can imagine, Ells was spoiled with more gifts. By this time, the art of gift-opening had been mastered. In addition to being showered with love by the grandparents and aunt who do not see her regularly, she also got to spend an afternoon with just Grandma while the rest of us went of to the movies. Mommy and Aunt Krista went to Les Miserables while Daddy and Grandpa went to Le Hobbit. (Side note: Les Miserables is awesome and you should see it, however, if you are not into musicals you might be disappointed. I confess, I did not really know the full story before going and for some reason I thought Anne Hathaway played the main character. Imagine my surprise when [SPOILER ALERT] she dies in the first 20 minutes.)
Anyway, Pullman was a winter playground. It didn't stop snowing until the day we left and could not have felt more like Christmas if Bing Crosby and Michael Buble waltzed in and sang "White Christmas" as a duet. (If you didn't catch the Buble Christmas special, this happened!)
Aunt Krista gave Elliot her very own chair!
Gramsy and Grandpa spoiled Ells with lots of fun toys and books!
Winter walk in the new Ergo :)
With family like this, she is proud to be a Rammelsberg!
Holy cow, that was a long post. Well, I wanted to do Christmas justice. Thanks for sticking with me.
Hope you had a wonderful holiday. From our family to yours, Merry Christmas!
