Our first Christmas present arrived in that Gramma & Grampa came to stay with us last Tuesday through the holiday. They, as always, have been a huge help entertaining the kids amidst the winter doldrums. They also helped us prepare for our impromptu Christmas Eve party with some neighbors and friends. Here's Tavin doing his part...
Gramma & Grampa got in on the cookie-making as well.
Grampa is really enjoying building his repore with Tavin and is willing to do just about anything to spend time with him, including crawling around with him on the floor. Grampa is such a good sport!
Grampa and Gramma have also had a lot of active playtime with the boys. Koen has developed a new game he enjoys playing with Gramma in the playroom where they "go to work." They sit in the window and wait until they see a bus go by on the street below. When it does, Koen rushes them into his bedroom where they pretend to ride the bus to work. They work at the zoo, by the way. After they work, they get on the bus in Tavin's room (it goes the opposite direction on the way home, so they can't use his room again). Then they take a brief rest on the floor with pillows and blankets (Gramma's favorite part), but that only lasts for an instant and Koen springs to life and they are back in the window waiting for the bus to take them to work again. So cute! Gramma is a trooper and enjoys watching Koen's imagination run wild.We had a nice few days leading up to Christmas with G&G and then Christmas Eve was special just preparing for the party, making cookies with Koen, going to the lovely Christmas Eve service at Northway Oakland and then home to celebrate with friends and family.
Christmas morning I got up a little before 7am. To my delight, we had a fresh covering of snow! A White Christmas!!!!!
I love being up before everyone on Christmas: lighting the candles, turning on Christmas music, setting up breakfast. It was the perfect start to the day. 
Tavin slept in well that morning and after I got him up, he and Doug and I went up to wake up Koen. 
Due to the party the night before, Koen had gone to bed about an hour late. He had only just woken up around 8am and was still quite sleepy when we got to him. We brought in his stocking to him and he seemed quite passive about the idea of getting to open a gift in bed. =) The gifts by the way were really lame. Two things Doug had won at a White Elephant gift exchange a few weeks ago. Koen thought they were fun though and perked up as he opened the gifts and the realization that it really was Christmas hit him.We all headed down to breakfast and slowly the rest of the family got up and ready to come down too. 
So one of the little stocking gifts was an expandable toys (where you put it in water and it gets bigger). So we threw this Abonimable Snowman (the character from the classic Rudolph movie) in a bowl of water. Nothing happened. I look at the package. It says, "can take up to 10 days to grow to full size." We totally burst out laughing. So much for that fun distraction. Koen was a good sport and now we have a pitcher of water with a slowly growing snowman inside. Hilarious! I'll have to let you all know how the growing goes after a few days. =)
Soon after breakfast we settled into opening presents. My family is a slow present opening family. We like to linger in the giving. Doug enjoys a faster process, but after 10 Christmases, he has gotten used to our glacial pace and does pretty well. Koen also dealt pretty well with everyone taking turns opening presents, helping us pass out presents, helping everyone open their presents, etc. He was very into presents this year, but we've been trying to help him understand that presents are just a way to celebrate what Christmas is really about. So to start the morning we read a sweet book called, "Santa's Favorite Story." Koen was into the storytime and it was fun to all focus on the real meaning of Christmas before we all dove in.
Koen did resume to "I want to open a present, no, one with a toy in it" eventually. We had to just remind ourselves he's 3 and just move on. Like I said though, he did very well. We didn't really do too much with getting new toys, but he did get some ebay train parts to add to his hand-me-down trains and he got some new trains for them too. 
He also got a trash truck he was really into.
So one of the little stocking gifts was an expandable toys (where you put it in water and it gets bigger). So we threw this Abonimable Snowman (the character from the classic Rudolph movie) in a bowl of water. Nothing happened. I look at the package. It says, "can take up to 10 days to grow to full size." We totally burst out laughing. So much for that fun distraction. Koen was a good sport and now we have a pitcher of water with a slowly growing snowman inside. Hilarious! I'll have to let you all know how the growing goes after a few days. =)
Soon after breakfast we settled into opening presents. My family is a slow present opening family. We like to linger in the giving. Doug enjoys a faster process, but after 10 Christmases, he has gotten used to our glacial pace and does pretty well. Koen also dealt pretty well with everyone taking turns opening presents, helping us pass out presents, helping everyone open their presents, etc. He was very into presents this year, but we've been trying to help him understand that presents are just a way to celebrate what Christmas is really about. So to start the morning we read a sweet book called, "Santa's Favorite Story." Koen was into the storytime and it was fun to all focus on the real meaning of Christmas before we all dove in.
Koen did resume to "I want to open a present, no, one with a toy in it" eventually. We had to just remind ourselves he's 3 and just move on. Like I said though, he did very well. We didn't really do too much with getting new toys, but he did get some ebay train parts to add to his hand-me-down trains and he got some new trains for them too. 
He also got a trash truck he was really into. It was so cute when he would open up something he was excited about. He would say, "oh my goodness!" He really enjoyed getting a snuggly blanket from my mom. 
Tavin got one too. 
Tavin got one too. Tavin did really well Christmas morning as well. He basically just entertained himself and "opened" a few presents with Koen's help. 
Later he took a nap and missed the rest of the present opening. It was crazy for me to think about the fact that last year at Christmas Tavin was a week old and this year he was crawling and pulling himself up on things. What an amazing change in one year! Check it out...
We had a nice light lunch of fun snacks. Then Koen played a little more until he went up to nap. In the afternoon Dad and Doug put up a new porch light which was my big surprise Christmas gift. It is beautiful. I'm so excited about it! The rest of the afternoon we relaxed and put things away, cleaned up, etc. Doug prepared a delicious meal for all of us and after the boys woke up we all enjoyed it. Tavin especially, he is just amazing. He is consistently out-pacing Koen now in most of his meals. The kid can eat! Here's a cute picture of him in the last present that he opened after his nap (he had missed getting to open it in the morning because of naptime).
Later we got the boys to bed and then really could relax. We hung out and played Apples to Apples (a new game we got from my parents...so fun!). Such a wonderful day with family. Again, I have to say, I love Christmas!
Later he took a nap and missed the rest of the present opening. It was crazy for me to think about the fact that last year at Christmas Tavin was a week old and this year he was crawling and pulling himself up on things. What an amazing change in one year! Check it out... 
We had a nice light lunch of fun snacks. Then Koen played a little more until he went up to nap. In the afternoon Dad and Doug put up a new porch light which was my big surprise Christmas gift. It is beautiful. I'm so excited about it! The rest of the afternoon we relaxed and put things away, cleaned up, etc. Doug prepared a delicious meal for all of us and after the boys woke up we all enjoyed it. Tavin especially, he is just amazing. He is consistently out-pacing Koen now in most of his meals. The kid can eat! Here's a cute picture of him in the last present that he opened after his nap (he had missed getting to open it in the morning because of naptime).
Later we got the boys to bed and then really could relax. We hung out and played Apples to Apples (a new game we got from my parents...so fun!). Such a wonderful day with family. Again, I have to say, I love Christmas!
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