Christmas!

Last night, Adam found an actual, real-live SPIDER in our kitchen! I was soooo excited! I made a big deal out of it, and we all put him on our Christmas tree and then I read the Ukrainian folk-tale of the spider. The kids absolutely loved it, and I couldn't believe the coincidence! (I had been planning on reading it to them anyway last night, but it sure made it all the more fun to do so with an actual spider in the house!) (The story is about a family too poor for Christmas decorations. The family's spider felt sorry for them so it worked all night to make webs all over the tree, and in the morning, the family had a gorgeous Christmas tree.)

This morning we opened presents, and the kids had a B-L-A-S-T!!!!!!!!! We started off the day by giving them their stocking... That was before John was to leave for work, so we thought it would be only right to let them have something to open before the "big" opening time when John came home from work at noon. Well, we decided to hide the stockings and have them find them. They thought that was fun, though they weren't real sure what they were looking for. They had boring stuff in their stocking - pencils, erasers, staplers, giant candy-canes, plus a few small toys. They thought they were in 7th Heaven, let me tell you! Big eye-opener for me. Never heard so many thank-yous, had so many hugs, etc. They were giddy with excitement over little stuff. (Though the girls did get fingernail polish and lip gloss which is Big Stuff over here...) ;O)

Anyway, John couldn't leave for work because the car was dead. Oh well.... (thank you God, that was nice!), So, we opened all the presents in the morning. We didn't have an extravagant budget this year, but thankfully the kids are excited over 99 cent army men, so it "felt" like a lot to them. *whew* (Wonder how many more years that will happen that way... This will probably be the last, huh?) (Oh well!)

Anyway, the girls loved their tiaras and play dress-up shoes, and promptly ran to their rooms to put on their princess dresses (the dress I saved from my sister's wedding plus that little white one for Aleksa.) They also had matching clip-on earrings. Liana opened hers and told us she wouldn't cry when we pounded the hole in her ears. Yikes!

At about noon, Adam opened the front door out of the blue. I was in the kitchen and I said, "Adam, what are you doing? Shut the door!" So, he looked at me funny, and then shut the door. He came into the kitchen and I said, "Why did you open the door, Adam, it's freezing out there?" He said, "Mama, tam big boy" ("Mama, there's a big boy out there.") Oops. So, I ran to the door and there was John's boss and his son. They dropped off a Christmas gift, and then offered to jumpstart our car. I thought a few seconds about being mortified about the enormous paper/boxes/garbage bags full of Christmas mess all over the house, but instead I decided it was a badge of honor, and that I was going to be proud of my mess this year. I've waited long and hard to finally have a disaster on Christmas morning from "the kids'" mess (that sure feels good to say!)

Then we went to my dad's house to give him his gifts and hang out a while. I had promised to remember something to give him later, so to remind myself, I put my wedding ring on my right hand. No problem, that would undoubtedly remind me. Except that after we ate, I noticed that my wedding ring is gone. What's funny about that is that when those Ukie shirts were gone, I was a wreck. I'm actually pretty nonchalant about the ring. It'll turn up, and if it doesn't, I know I'm married, and the kids know I'm married, and the rest of my friends and family knows I'm married. It wasn't like it was a huge rock or anything anyway. That's the beauty of being poor. If we had spent thousands on it, it might very well have "ruined" my Christmas. Whatever. I had the best day in a long time!

We had a turkey dinner, plus a birthday cake for Jesus, and then afterward, we all went sledding on the kids' new sleds! Great fun all around. Came home, had some hot chocolate, and then played and played and played.

The biggest shocker of the day was that Adam has loved to play with the play food, cupboard and play stove every bit as much as the girls have. We have caught him in the girls' room many, many times today playing alone with their cooking stuff.

Wonderful, wonderful day!

Oh, btw, the reason we opened presents today was because we're headed up north to John's grandparents' house bright and early in the morning.

Merry Christmas everyone! I hope you all have a wonderful day with your families and friends!