Oh, and also, a ton of recycling and a multitude of Legos! But let me start at the beginning . . .
Way back in early December, we met up with St. Nick at the home of Macon's best friend, Trey. Santa makes a personal visit to Trey's house every year and this was our second year seeing him there. Amazingly, he remembered the boys' names.
Jed talked to him for about 20 minutes.
Macon wouldn't get too close until Trey joined him.
When Santa left, Jed was hot on his heels, wanting to see how Santa would depart. Of course, the reindeer can't fly Santa all over creation for his pre-Christmas engagements, so Santa drives a Toyota Tundra (duh) with the license plate reading S. Claus.
On Christmas Eve, our family gathered: all three grandparents plus Sarah's extended Wilson and Woodard families. However, by the 24th, Sarah had come down with a much milder version of Jed's stomach bug, and Jed himself was not quite over it, so Jed and Sarah bitterly watched movies in bed upstairs while Eric and Sarah's cousin-in-law, Tim, cooked for a crowd.
By Christmas morning, Sarah was feeling somewhat better and had realized that she wasn't going to actually throw up, which made soldiering-on a bit more do-able, which was good because it was an early day: Macon was caught about half-way down the stairs at 3:30 a.m. and when I returned him to bed, Jed was awake, too, and very angry with Macon for possibly "messing up Santa." At 5:30, they woke up for good, but Eric coaxed them into watching a couple of their favorite shows before waking Marmie. Finally, at 6:30, we sent them to Marmie's room where Jed unceremoniously woke her by cutting on the overhead light without warning.
Game on.
A note from Santa telling the boys that the garage is for both of them.
After they inspected their Santa loot and played with it, they opened our gift to them: Transformers Rescue Bots. Normally, we dig into a gift-opening free-for-all, but we (successfully) distracted them from full-scale opening until Grandma and Grandpa could arrive.
By 8, Jed was starting on the first of several Lego projects . . .
. . . and Macon had the Rescue Bots lined up.
Completed fire truck: one Lego set done.
Eventually, Grandma and Grandpa arrived and Sarah's picture-taking energy flagged, but she did think to get a photo of the porch decorations,
and we headed to the cemetery to test out the remote control helicopter that the Woodards gave Jed. It's hard to photograph, but it's really flying.
By the late-afternoon, Macon's early wake-ups had caught up with him . . .
. . . and a Christmas flu bug had started catching up with the rest of the family: of the 18 people at our house for Christmas Eve lunch, 6 came down with the flu or mild-ish flu by the weekend! It seems that most of the victims are recovered or recovering, and our household managed to avoid it (knock on wood), but Jed seems to be coming down with yet another cold just as he's finally getting past his stomach bug (which is now plaguing Macon)! Hopefully, 2015 will be a bit healthier for all of us.
