Christmas Family Fun...

On Sunday, we had our annual Family Christmas with Mommy's family.  We watched the Patriots game which didn't start well but ended with a big win for the Pats!

 We watched uncle Gary's shoot off some rockets into the sky (that went really far up!)

 We opened some presents - the kids were so excited!  Alexander loved opening presents and got so many cool/wonderful gifts.  He truly is a lucky little boy!

Christmas Festivities...

It was quite the busy Christmas weekend for all!  There was cookie baking, Christmas lights, train rides, presents, Mass, visits with family & friends, presents, cookies for Santa, oh and did we mention presents?

Weekend festivities started on Friday as we had the day off - Mommy & Alexander baked some cookies for Santa before we headed to Mimi & Papi's house.  From there, we then went with them to Edaville Railroad for our annual visit to see the Christmas lights and ride the train.  It wasn't raining like last year and because it was right before Christmas, it wasn't as busy either - so overall a great night to go.

 Christmas Eve started with some traditional fried dough (which Alexander wasn't that interested in), followed by some presents.  We then headed to Christmas Eve mass at St. Marks in which Alexander did extremely well. He loved watching the children tell the story of the birth of Christ and was very enthralled. 

After mass, we headed to our annual stop at our restaurant before going to Dennis & Mary's.  It was eerily quiet and we almost had the place to ourselves.  We then headed over to Dennis & Mary's where Alexander was very excited to play with Kyle & Kaileen.  After some goofing around, dinner & pictures, it was time to get into jammies and head home to ensure we were in bed for Santa!

This is what is looked like after Santa stopped by

Christmas morning was the BEST!  Not only did Alexander surprise me by sleeping until 7:05am but he was so excited with everything he opened.  He rushed downstairs (nearly beating me down), and hugged his presents!  He was beyond delighted when he saw his "Green Hot Wheel" bike, even more so when he saw his name on the back!  The quote of the day was "I've wanted this my whole life" - it made everything so special that he was so excited! 

Santa brought him lots of goodies which he loved all of them, well except the pajamas.  He even loved going thru his stocking to see how much candy was there.

After presents, we hung out for a bit relaxing.  Alexander & Daddy played their new Wii baseball game.  The boys then got ready to head over to uncle Matt's house for more presents.  After presents at Matt's, they then headed to uncle Steven's for dinner & time with the boys.  Alexander played some more Wii and had a great afternoon hanging out with all the cousins.

Monday was a perfect day!  It was a very low-key, chill out kind of day.  Alexander stayed in his pajamas all day, we played Wii, played games, cuddles, watched movies/tv.  Perfect way to end a great yet busy weekend!

Big Man...

That's right - he's a big man now.  He has his very own "Green Hot Wheels" bike.  He's now officially "grownd up".  

Christmas JOY...

"OH! I wanted this my whole life!" 

-Alexander (said throughout Christmas morning as he continued to unwrap presents)

That's when you know that the presents from Santa were perfect!

Christmas Love...

Sharing Christmas Joy with Mommy and Daddy

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to all & to all a good year!

Love,

Alexander

Toys For Tots...

This year, Alexander made a donation to Toys For Tots.  I went thru his toys that he hasn't used/played with and we donated them to boys & girls who are less fortunate than he is.  I was going to drop them off during lunch but I wanted him to be a part of it and know why we were donating the toys.  I'm hoping it's an annual tradition we can do every year. 

I explained to him what we were donating and why as we drove to the State Police barracks.  For a second, I thought he was going to put up a fight/cry over losing his toys but he quickly stopped his whining as I was telling him about boys & girls who don't have toys.  I'm not going to lie - I was impressed that he listened and seemed to understand. 

We dropped off the two bags of unused toys and after we left, he asked me "Mom, do you really think we made some boy happy? Because I think so."  And that made my heart grow!

Magic of Christmas...

And this is what Christmas is all about when you're a kid...

Pure Joy!

Christmas Recap...

Christmas Recap...We had a very busy, yet nice Christmas weekend

Friday, December 24th - Christmas Eve
Christmas Eve started with a lot of baking - we baked cookies, then dessert & appetizer for Christmas dinner. Then Alexander decided to practice as Santa before heading out to play in the snow with Daddy. After the snow, both Daddy & Alexander went to get a haircut (it was a spur of the moment thing for Alexander but he got one at his first non-kid place)

That afternoon, we went to Mass at St. Marks where Alexander did a great job. We got to see the school kids perform the birth of baby Jesus & a performance to 'O Holy Night'. After mass, we headed to our annual tradition, the "dive-bar" restaurant to meet Mimi, Papi & Auntie before it was time to go to Dennis & Mary's. This year, other people in the restaurant couldn't get over how cute & entertaining Alexander was as he ran around. Then we went to Dennis & Mary's for dinner & to hang out with family. Alexander got to play "Simon Says" with the kids and had a blast...

Then we headed home to be ready for Santa!

Saturday, December 25th - Christmas Day
Christmas morning, Alexander woke up at 7:40am! He never sleeps that late! We opened presents but all he was interested in was finding his trumpet! He opened one gift first but really just wanted the trumpet. After that, it was hard to get him to open anything else, Daddy had to do a lot of enticing...we did end up opening all of the presents & even a family picture before we headed out the door (an hour later than we hoped for).

We headed to Mimi & Papi's to exchange gifts before it was time to go to Gary & Sharon's for dinner. For some reason, Alexander still was not that interested in opening presents. He did, however, help Papi open his presents.

After presents, we went to Gary & Sharon's for the afternoon. It was a very nice time and what was even better was Alexander's comfort with the dogs. The dogs were very well behaved & he even sat with Daddy long enough to pat Tessie without freaking out. He's still not comfortable if the dogs are moving around but if they're lying down, he'll test out the waters. We had a great dinner, and then the kids opened their presents. Chris & Alexander even played table tennis on playstation. Alexander did such a good job with the game that he beat Chris & Papi, however Daddy took away Alexander's title...tsk tsk tsk.

We headed back to Mimi & Papi's for a sleep-over as we were going to be in the area the following day. Alexander slept in with Auntie & did a great job sleeping in a big bed all night!

Sunday, December 26th - Day after Christmas
Started the morning with a good breakfast of eggs, sausage & bacon, and then Auntie helped Alexander open the presents from Christmas day that he was not interested in.

We headed to Billy's for Spaulding Family Christmas and it was a huge success - everyone was there for us to take a family picture! And this time Alexander was excited to open presents and kept asking "is there more presents for me?" After picture, presents & pizza, folks started to head out as a blizzard was starting to accumulate some snow and we knew we had a long drive. And despite the silly drivers, we made it home safe & sound!

Overall, a very long, busy yet enjoyable Christmas weekend with everyone happy! Alexander got a lot of wonderful presents from Santa & others this holiday season. We thank you!

Merry Christmas & Happy New Year!

Christmas Recap in Photos...

Photos for Christmas Weekend

Christmas EveChristmas Morning
Christmas DaySpaulding Family Christmas

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to all & to all a good night!

Have a funky, funky Christmas!

Love,

Alexander

Family Christmas Bash...

We had our first ever Christmas Bash with Dan's entire immediate family - Grandma & Pop-Pop, all the kids & their spouses and all of the grandkids! Even Uncle Tony & Aunt Fran joined us for some holiday celebrations!

It was the first time all of us have been in the same place at the same time! And it was a good time for everyone! We were able to get good family shots - one with Grandma & Pop-Pop with all of their grandkids; another group photo with everyone!
Grandma had a moment and gave out ornaments to each of the kids and each of her ornaments was specific to each kid. She asked "which kid likes to go fishing with Dad?" And Alexander raised his hand matter of factly as if to say "yeah, that's me"...it was pretty funny.We had craft time for the kids to help keep them entertained/busy. They made Christmas crafts for Grandma & Pop-Pop. Then it was time for presents (aka - chaos)!