Christmas 2009
Christmas this year I knew was going to be a ton of fun since Sam is just about 2 ½ and his understanding of how to tear into gifts was realized on his birthday! But with the understanding of ripping into gifts also comes the misunderstanding that you can’t climb the tree and slash gifts open the second they are placed under the tree.
The Saturday after Thanksgiving was a bright, slightly cool day and was a perfect day to load up the family in the van to venture out to find and cut down the Crandell family Christmas tree. Every year we head out to Black Forest Pines on US 62 outside of J ohnstownGeorge now being the pro at cutting down trees it only took a minute and wha-la!, the tree was down and on the sled and we were heading back to the barn to shake the tree, pay and get it home to decorate!
In years past our dog, Boomer didn’t quite understand why a huge tree was in the middle of our living room. But this year he just laid down and watched us decorate, he didn’t even try to get under the tree to drink the water or sleep on the tree skirt. Sam on the other hand didn’t understand that the pretty Christmas bulbs were not baseballs and you can’t take them off the tree and throw them. It was a good week because he finally stopped showing interest in the tree and finally gave up and went back to playing with his toys.
Second obstacle of the Christmas season with Sam was to not touch the presents. I wrapped all the gifts one day while he was napping so when he woke up to see new things under the tree my curious toddler of course had to investigate. One gift in particular was a bit big so I put it in a big bag and only wrapped the top of the gift because it stuck out of the bag. I was in the kitchen preparing the sugar cookies to be rolled out when I heard tearing of wrapping paper. I walked out in the living room to see Sam smiling and wringing his hands as if he was saying “I really want to see what’s in there”. After a few “No’s” he stopped trying to rip the paper but started to “accidentally” drop his toys in the bag. He would come in the kitchen, grab my hand, drag me out to the living room and point at the bag and say “mommy get it, mommy get it” and I would see that he dropped some toy in the bag. Again, about after a week of this he stopped and left the presents alone.
This same day of Sam trying to get into the bag was the same day I thought of making sugar cookies. I figured it would be a nice distraction for Sam to stay away from the gifts and Christmas ornaments and fun for him to decorate the cookies. The first batch of cookies I made was so bad that I couldn’t even roll them out they were so tacky. Being pregnant I get tired super fast and said to myself I’m not trying to make them again so I called George to pick up a package of Betty Crocker sugar cookies that all I had to do was add butter and an egg! Sam and I remade the cookies the next day and he had a blast helping make the cookies and decorate them. I was a very proud mommy that day as did something that made my son smile and enjoy!
Later that day I had errands to run so I packed Sam up and off we went. We were gone a couple hours and upon our arrival home Sam needed a nap. I took Sam upstairs, read his book and headed down to let the dog outside. I flopped on the couch to rest my legs and watch a movie. About an hour went by and I was hungry so I headed to the kitchen to make myself a sandwich and when I entered the kitchen I found myself stepping on tiny bits of stuff. I look down and it was a ton of sprinkles from our Christmas cookies. I thought “how weird, I know I swept after making these cookies” only to look up and see that there was a piece of wax paper on the floor, empty. It downed on me why the dog didn’t follow me up the stairs like he usually does, HE ATE THE COOKIES!!!!! He put his grubby paws up on our portable dishwasher, snagged the wax paper with his teeth and/or paws and pulled the cookies down on the floor and had himself a feast! The dog was lucky on two accounts, a.) The tot was sleeping so I couldn’t yell at him and, b.) I don’t own a gun! He even ate Sam’s “special” cookie that he himself told me how to decorate very specifically. After I calmed down I counted the cookies and we were left with only 9. So that meant Boomer approximately ate about 10 cookies. I decided that making sugar cookies this year was not in my cards and I never made any more.
The rest of the weeks leading up to Christmas were going swimmingly. All my Christmas shopping got done in two trips; wrapping done in a day and a happy healthy family was excited for Christmas. Sam even got overjoyed at looking at the neighborhood Christmas lights that George and I would took him around to see all the pretty lights. (It’s going to be hard to explain to him after Christmas why the lights are gone).
Everything was great until Sam got sick with croup and a cold a week before Christmas and of course mommy caught the cold. Christmas was spent opening gifts and blowing noses but all in all Christmas was a true success! Sam got a ton of new toys and had 3 different Christmas’; one with us, one with Grandma and Grandpa and one with Grams from Texas. He is very lucky boy! Despite the colds we all had a lovely Christmas with all our family and our travels to and from all of the Christmas celebrations were easy.
Next year will be even more exciting as we will have another toddler around our tree opening gifts and sharing in the Christmas holiday fun. Let’s just hope that there are no colds and the dog doesn’t eat the cookies!
Thanks for Reading
~Andrea
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