Christmas time is here again, and as you can see, we got our yearly visit as there are plenty of presents beneath the tree and around the fireplace. The cookies were attacked last night, and the milk all gone too. Christmas is here again!
It came a little earlier than usual this year, mainly because of one joke we were making yesterday. I was not necessarily complaining, but rather comparing Maddie to most kids growing up at Christmas time. Mom and I were explaining to Maddie that in all her years - ever since the beginning - she's never gotten up early on Christmas morning so that she could race down the stairs and open those presents. She's never once ran into our room and woke us up yelling, "It's Christmas!" That's right, she usually sleeps in! So all these years, we all get to sleep in somewhat - somewhat - and just have a nice slow-to-rise sort of morning.
But this morning, she took our words to heart yesterday and actually set her alarm for 6am. Yes, at 6am while all was still dark outside, Maddie came running in full speed and woke the two of us up in bed yelling, "It's Christmas! It's Christmas!" And we were laughing because it was all so unlike her, and before anyone could take any of this seriously, she smiled and said, "Okay, goodnight!" And went back down the hall to go back to sleep for a bit.
But don't worry. Christmas did indeed come of course. We enjoyed some of the gluten free cakes with icing that Mom picked up yesterday, and we made ourselves some special coffee as well, all while Christmas music played and Maddie did the role of head elf, distributing the gifts to where each of us can open them up one at a time.
Now some places everyone opens the gifts all at once, and this is no criticism of that. In this house, we like to open them up one at a time and watch everyone's reactions as they get this gift or that. And the name tags are a big deal here, as sometimes it takes longer to figure out a name that a particular gift is from, something that gives a slight hint as to what the gift inside may be.
For example, this gift is from East Forsyth High School, or other gifts are from movie characters like Proximus or Anger, from "Inside Out."
Oh, look! Even Ajax got some gifts this morning. There were some Build-a-Bear clothing items under the tree for him as well, from Matt Olson (Braves clothing) and also some graduation themed items too (from Troy and Gabriella).
You can see Polaroid was a theme of the morning too, as Maddie's very much into all things Polaroid. She got a lot of film from Uncle George, but there were also other little things this year, like a Christmas ornament, plus a key chain, plus a large build-a-polaroid block set, which you'll see later.
Oh, there it is now! This was pretty cool, and at first Maddie thought it would be fairly quick and easy to put together. Moo-ah-ah-ah. That's foreshadowing there.
You can see she got plenty of new clothing from a themed store she saw a lot of items from. She was there this summer for the first time, visiting a physical location at a mall as we were at the Battle of Atlanta event. Santa must have known she liked a lot of these items - Lilo and Stitch clothing, plus plenty of clothing with Miyazaki themes too, like Calcifer pajamas. Maddie got some gifts from the susuwatari, those little black fuzzy things from a few Miyazaki movies.
Oh, and here's a new bag she's excited to have (from Bilbo Baggins), replacing the other one that's been slowly wearing down. And look at the faces on the movie she's opening up now.
Oh, there's those Calcifer pajamas. Right in front of the virtual fire there too! We didn't need a fire in the fireplace today, as the weather outside was fairly warm and sunny, at least by comparison to previous days.
This is a funny label. Imagine going through all this effort to make a box for a quality product, and missing the ball that much on spelling. Mom got some nice items today, this being one of them. You'll see it later, but it was a nice thing from Maddie. Mom also got a new set of headphones - the highest quality ones you can get - and some Bon Ami (from Luther Heggs). We had no idea they still made Bon Ami. Mom joked that now she had something to clean Maddie's bathtub with! Mom also got a copy of "The Music Man" (from Ferris Bueller and Maleficent), lots of body wash, new jackets and sweaters, a nice bird book, a new hummingbird feeder, and other items too. I got some new vinyl records that look amazing, a book with a collection of Discworld art, new jeans, some Wallace and Gromit figures and other things. Here's a few more pictures of Maddie having a great time opening her gifts.
Ah, this is from the Battle of Atlanta Committee. Maddie was thinking it was going to be something related to taekwondo or the event itself, like a framed picture or something. But she burst out laughing when she saw that it was a Funko Pop figure of Dengar, a Star Wars character known for having a bandage on his head. Yes, like the one Maddie wore after getting hit on the head with a sword after the Battle of Atlanta (because they made the demonstration space too small).
Oh, and look at this gift from her pal Ajax:
Yes, that's a full-on Axolotl onesie, complete with a tail too. It had the whole "pink bunny suit" vibe, so Maddie posed for a picture wearing it while on the stairwell. Unlike Ralphie, I think Maddie might like this and might wear it more often than he would.
Ah, and here's a new taekwondo bag (from Lord Baggington, Esquire). She needed one of those. The morning went on for a good bit, with occasional breaks, but plenty of laughter and joy and Christmas spirit as we opened our gifts.
So after this, we got to cleaning up right away. Always a big ordeal with the wrapping paper and boxes, but we cleaned up pretty well. As mentioned earlier, Nana has the flu, so we knew we weren't going over there today, which is still shocking. Rather than have Mom prepare some big Christmas meal here, we decided to do the "A Christmas Story" thing, and go off to our favorite Chinese restaurant.
That's right, we went to Wang's on Christmas Day. It was open all day, and by the look of things, many, many other people had the same exact idea. Still, we got there just right and secured the last booth, and sat down to enjoy a wonderful Christmas meal together, although we didn't opt for any goose.
We got home after that, and the day was pretty chill from there on. Maddie started this building block project, and had no idea that there were this many tiny little bricks inside!
Ah, Maddie finally finished her tiny Polaroid model. This took a long time, and she's quite proud of it. It even opens up, and out from it comes a little polaroid picture too!
Okay, one more thing: today is not just Christmas. It's Hanukkah! This morning I had gotten Mom a few things like a Hanukkah devotional and some chocolate coins. She brought up the menorah, and ordered new candles, because the next eight nights we'll be lighting candles. We might do the dreidel thing tomorrow, and there's this other craft we have too, one we've been holding on to for years. But tonight was the first night, so we had Maddie attempt to light the shamash candle.
She's laughing here because she didn't know how to use the lighter at first, and so we were reading this scripture from Deuteronomy with such reverence and the entire time she's struggling with the lighter! As you can see, we got it figured out!
The rest of the night was quiet. I was listening to a few vinyl records, Mom was enjoying some of her new bath stuff, and we eventually watched a few other things on television, like the new episode of "Skeleton Crew," which ended in quite the cliffhanger.
At the end of it all, we were upstairs where it all began at 6am this morning. We read from "A Christmas Carol" again, reading of the visit from Christmas Present, and then we read some from "Hogfather." And then it was time for prayers, and for sleep. It was a quiet Christmas together, but it was still very, very nice.
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