Punished

We we at the airport waiting to fly to California and we got there early so I sat down near an outlet to let the kids watch a movie. I was flying by myself with the kids so we broke down and got a DVD player for them to watch. Well, they didn't want to watch a movie so they sang songs and watched airplanes take off.

In the area that we were in were three men. There was something odd about them. They were definitely together but they weren't talking like they were coworkers or friends. There was maybe one other person in the area so it was very quiet and we were sitting close to the tree men because that is where the outlets where.

John starts singing the second Article of Faith:

We believe that men will be punished for their own sins
And not for Adam's transgressions
And not for Adam's transgressions.

Kind of a bit weird to have you almost 3 yearly singing this at full volume in public places. It is a good thing we live in the Bible Belt and people will just assume we are Baptist. Anyway, John just keeps singing this over and over.

Fast forward and the three men decide to get up and go to their gate. Two of the stand up to leave and then the third man gets up and I notice that he has never taken his hands out of his coat pockets. When he turns sideways I could see he had handcuffs on! I just wondered what he thought of John's song.

The men were on our plane and as it turns out that United does not have priority boarding for families with small children but they do have priority boarding for those traveling on a extradition order.

Christmas

This is a hard post because Christmas lasts for a bout a month so there might be some random order to things as I remember them.

First off: our advent calendar. Last year I came across something where people did a random act of kindness for everyday leading up to Christmas. So we did it last year and I think I made it more manageable this year. Last year I wrote down what we would do for the 25 days leading up to Christmas. This year I winged it and made it up as the day presented opportunities. I don't think I missed a single day this year. The kids loved to think up nice things that we could do for people.

I will record the highlights. We were at the grocery store and planned to let someone in line in front of us, but there was no line. (Oddly enough we tried this on a number of occasions and there were just no lines - hard to complain about that!) So I decided to purchase a candy bar for the checkout clerk. I casually asked her what her favorite candy bar was. She didn't commit to anything so I bought her a dove bar. I handed it to her after she gave me my receipt. Her face lit up like I would have never guessed. She was so excited! I was surprised, honestly. She then gave the kids a ton of Buddy Bucks. Buddy Bucks are fake money looking things that the kids insert into a machine and a wheel turns and then the kid pushes a button and the wheel stops on a number and the machine spits out a sticker with the points on it. They can then save up the points and get a prize. Anther highlight was at the library. We were checking out and I was going to pay someone's library fee. As I was checking out there was a lady paying her fee. It was something like $5 but she only had  a $20 and the library didn't have change for a $20. I happened to have a $5 so I gave it to her and asked if I could pay her fee. She was shocked and said she was so touched that she was going to cry. That one I found touching. Another trip to the library we were going to pay someone's fees again. I held Emma up to the counter and Emma whispered that she wanted to pay someone's fees. The librarian was surprised and and it was good for Emma to see her reaction to the act of kindness. Another time we took cookies to a fire house. John just about flung himself at the firetruck. This act of kindness was paid back by the firefighters letting the kids climb on the truck. A firefighter asked John if he wanted to drive the truck. John took him literally and said "no" because he knows he isn't supposed to drive a truck. Once we cleared up the confusion, then John threw himself at the truck but was sure to ask,  "It won't move right?" Lastly, I made rolls with my mom for Christmas Eve dinner. A friend of mine loves the rolls so I made some for her. I had Aaron and the kids deliver them while I finished up in the kitchen. Emma came home as proud as could be. She and John went to the door without Aaron. She spoke to the dad of this family and told him Merry Christmas and prompted John to say "Merry Christmas." Speaking to adults is a huge deal for Emma. It was worth it to see her have a victory and feel proud of herself.

We had my parents and sister Emily come to stay for Christmas. It was a ton of fun to have them here. Emily builds some impressive train set ups. She is also great at making snowflakes with. She can turn a cutie orange into a penguin. She is also a mover and moves kids in boxes all around the world or my family room. It also turns out that she know weird secrets like you can poke meat to tell how done it is instead of cutting into it. She also knows cool things to do like stencils. She is a fun aunt.

It was fun to laugh and play with family, eat yummy food, assemble kids toys together and just visit. We went to the zoo (one of our family traditions for December). The kids loved to see the animals. I got to do Anderson family girls shopping the day after Christmas. Aaron and my dad and the kids shopped for granite.

At one point in the visit, Emily was playing with John and he started to say, "what the hex!" He was meaning to say heck. Some neighbor kids taught this to him. I was trying to stifle the whole thing and he got confused and was wondering if "hexagon" was a swear word. So after a long time of sorting through confusion, I think he knows hexagon isn't a swear word.

For Christmas Aunt Mary got John a front loader digger. The kid was in love! It was hard to get him to look at his other gifts. He did however, really like a little fork lift that my parents got him and some construction legos that we got him. He also liked his tools.

Emma was a hard nut to shop for because she didn't know what she wanted. My parents got her these light up shoes. You can see her coming a mile away. They are tie die colored and brightly colored and she loves them. We get all sorts of comments on them. Emma also got sticker earnings from Aunt Mary and Emma wears a pair just about every day. She also got arts and craft stuff. Aunt Emily got the kids some games that they really like.

It was a fun Christmas. The only things I would do differently is I would simplify meals for Christmas Eve. And by simplify I mean do take out. And on Christmas, I would do Merry Christmas Rice and Beans. It is simple and the kids like it. That way we aren't cooking and cleaning all the time. No fancy meals for us.

Prayers

John is starting to say prayers without being prompted. It makes for some memorable family prayers.

One time he said thank you for the letter 'c' because 'c' is for cookie. He also said thank you that he could cover his eyes so that the monster couldn't see him.

Today we went to a friends house to make graham cracker houses. They had a toy workbench and John couldn't be bothered to make a house when there were tools to play with. So when John was saying the dinner prayer, he was thanking Heavenly Father for the tools and the hard hat. From there he went on to list off his Christmas wish list - an excavator. Aaron cut him off to remind him to say thank you for dinner.

Caroling

We went grocery shopping at HEB today to get our food for Christmas. We don't normally shop on a Saturday because it is so busy but I couldn't avoid it this time. That is the set up for our caroling, and by our I mean Emma's and John's caroling.

As I was going up and down the busy isles, the kids were singing at a normal volume "Jingle Bells" - both versions (the normal and the batman smells version). Some people noticed and smiled at us. However, when we got to the produce section where it is more open, John decided to belt out "Jingle Bells" over and over and over. Emma has enough semblance of self awareness that she dropped out. I should explain John's singing.... he has the words down and the general idea of the tune, but the best part is that he mostly shouts the song. I got all some smiles and some chuckles and a bunch of comments. The produce manager asked if he could put John on the payroll as a caroler for the store. One lady told me that he made her day. People across the produce section where stopping, looking up, and smiling at John. He was a hit. I have to say that I have been giggling at our grocery shopping trip all day long. It just made me happy to hear the kids singing Christmas carols in the store with no regard to themselves and to see them make those around them happy.

UPS Man

We have been getting a lot of packages at the door given the season. John and Emma have taken the boxes, put their own toys in and are playing UPS man. They deliver the packages to Emma's door, knock and run away. John was the UPS man this time and it turns out that he wanted to climb on top of the side of his toddler bed and pretend that he is driving the truck. His toddler bed is a crib with the front removed so he is above my belly button and if he falls, he could fall to the ground where there is a host of his trucks to land on. So I have told him that he can't be up there and needs to get down. This cause weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth. Once he calmed down he said, "I want to talk about it." This means he wants to enter into negotiations. He explained to me his side - that this was his truck and he needed to drive it. I explained he could fall and offered him the mailbox to sit on as a truck. He countered that the mailbox wasn't as high as his truck. I asked him what would happen if he fell and got hurt. He explained to me that you get back up and shake it off. I couldn't really counter that one. So I caved and he was happy driving his truck and delivering packages.

Dainty and Excavator Mom

I was telling Emma our plans for tomorrow as I was laying down with her to put her to bed. I told her that Aaron and I were going to go to Anadarko's holiday party in the evening and that we are going to get to a babysitter. Emma asked if she could go. I told her that it was just for adults and that it was going to be boring for kids. She asked what we were going to do. I told her that we would eat dinner and listen to music. She then said, "And talk dainty?" I was stunned and then I said, "yes." I don't know how dainty it will be with Maroon 5 playing but close enough. Apparently she got the "dainty" talk from a Henry and Mudge book.

We checked out a Digger Man book. In it a boy buys a digger and then gets digger man boots and a hard hat. So this morning John was telling me he needed a hard hat. Aaron had a hard hat from his ExxonMobil days so he got it out for John. He was elated. We play a game where I lay on the ground on my back and he sit on my stomach and moves my knees and feet to dig and dump "dirt" out. He sat there this morning with his hard hat and sang "That's What Excavators Do." He was calling me "Excavator Mommy."

Thanksgiving

We celebrated Thanksgiving with some friends from our ward. It was a nice dinner and then the kids were able to play with friends.

One of the things we did this year for a new tradition was I got some branches from the park and put them in a vase and every night we write something we are grateful for on a leaf and tape it to the branches. The kids have loved it.

John has given responses like Cookie Monster, Spider-man, the park, the library, mom, dad. Emma has said things like school, Hello Kitty, family, the library, and the park. It has been fun to see what the kids think about when you ask them what they are grateful for. I would say that it helped me to stop and think about something that happened that day that I was grateful for and then to talk about it with the kids.

It was hard to be away from family during Thanksgiving but it made me think about growing up away from family. We would spend Thanksgiving (and every other holiday for that matter) with the same families from our ward. I have wonderful memories of playing with friends and eating jello salad with mayo on top with shredded carrots. Ok so maybe that last one is more of a funny memory than a fond memory.