A Sweet, Slow-Paced December

Our December is usually SO busy. We usually have Christmas programs, Santa visits, Christmas parties, traveling, and LOTS of family get-togethers. But this is 2020. Nothing is normal. And this has become our new normal. This December, we hardly left home (well, Ryan did for work…but the kids and I stayed in our pajamas throughout the majority of the month!) With Covid raging through the midwest, we’ve been extra cautious and have limited our contacts as much as possible. Part of me craved the crazy, busy lifestyle that we’re used to in December, but overall, we truly embraced being home together as a family. 

Here is a recap of our December…

Ryan’s Birthday

Ryan actually had his birthday off, and I wanted him to actually relax and enjoy it, so we drive up and spent his birthday at the lake. It was such a nice, relaxing day. Ryan got to spend his day with his favorite people, we had ice cream cake, and on the way home, we saw Christmas lights. 

While we were at the lake, we let the kids drop off their letters for Santa at a nearby Santa mailbox. Kinsie asked for science kits, a Fiona the hippo calendar, and books. Brax asked for dinosaur toys and the video game Jurassic World Evolution. Brody didn’t have any preferences this year, so he just came along for the ride!

Kinsie’s back to virtual school

We knew it would eventually happen again. And with the rising numbers, we saw it coming so we gave her a heads up. Kinsie was pretty bummed when her school district decided to go back to all online. Even though the schools are doing an AMAZING job with mask-wearing, cleaning and sanitizing and social distancing, the district makes their decisions based on the county’s positivity rate. Luckily, it was only for about 2 weeks before Christmas break, but I was sad that she didn’t get to enjoy all the Christmas fun and activities at school. She was sad, but enjoyed some extra time with Brody. She will get to start in person again to start the new semester, so our fingers are crossed that she’ll get to remain in person! 

Staying Busy at Home

As most of you probably know, we have some BUSY kids! While they are usually really good at being creative and using their imagination when they play, they’ve had a little too much together-ness, so we’ve had to help come up with activities to keep them busy so they don’t fight so much! Our staying home activities included…

Playing in the tent and sibling reading time…

Learning how to make pottery with a pottery wheel that Kinsie got for her birthday…

Decorating a gingerbread house…

Christmas crafts…

and making Christmas cookies…

Rare Outside Time

Indiana winter has kind of slapped us in the face this month. I think it’s trying to remind us what we’ve been missing the last three years! There were about 3-4 days, however, where it was somewhat warm enough to be outside. The kids had severe cabin fever, so as SOON as we had the opportunity, we took it! They played on their ninja course, played “Hogwarts,” (complete with a ride on the Hogwarts Express, a Sorting Hat ceremony, and wizarding lessons), and even played in the snow when we had a small snowfall. And when I say small, we could still see the grass…and it was still more snow in one day than we got in 3 years in Arkansas!

Ryan got vaccinated!

We were SO excited for Ryan to receive his first Covid-19 vaccine! As a healthcare worker, he was honored to be one of the first groups of people to receive the vaccine. This is history in the making, and the biggest step we can take to do our part to help beat this thing (other than masking up and social distancing of course). He’ll receive his second vaccine in a couple weeks. We all can’t wait for our turn…hopefully sooner rather than later!

Progress on our House

They are still moving along with our house and we are so excited! This month they completed the electrical wiring, HVAC, and plumbing, which wasn’t very “visible” progress, but still exciting! They also added the garage doors, and now the entire house is dry-walled. We still love taking trips over there, and when we do, the kids don’t want to leave!

Standing in their rooms!

Christmas Activities

Christmas was definitely different this year, but we still found lots of ways to celebrate the season safely. This was a great opportunity to slow down and focus on the REAL reason for the season!

One thing I really miss about Arkansas is the amazing women’s bible study I was in. And as SOON as we are able to, we can’t wait to find another church home. Anyway, a few years ago, in my bible study, we made an Advent study for our kids using the Jesus Storybook Bible. My kids love doing this every year! They know the stories by heart, but they still love hearing them over and over, and celebrating Jesus as the best gift we’ve ever received!

Matching Christmas pajamas are always a must! My sweet boys rocking their Santa jammies!

We took a few opportunities throughout the month to drive around and look at Christmas lights and displays. 

Christmas Morning

Christmas morning is truly magical when you have kids. I am always so happy to watch their eyes light up when they see what Santa brought them! From Santa, Kinsie got the science kits and Fiona calendar she wanted, and she also got a “Fiona kiss,” a Hufflepuff mug (she recently took the official Pottermore Sorting Hat quiz and discovered she is a Hufflepuff and couldn’t be more proud!), and a unicorn nightlight. She was also super excited to get a Kids Kindle from us. She has already downloaded tons of books and reads from her Kindle every day! When Brax saw his dinosaur toys that Santa brought him, he literally dove at them and starting “swimming” in them. He was so excited! And Brody loved his Harry Potter bear, and fun books and toys! However, he spent most of his morning climbing on unopened presents and trying to eat the wrapping paper and bows!

Kinsie’s school did a “Penguin Patch Holiday Shop,” where the kids could shop online and buy little items for their friends and family. I told her how much she could spend, and she picked out small toys for her brothers, all of her cousins, and our dog Koda. She was SO excited to give her gifts to everyone! I think my girl has the gift of giving like her mama and grandmas!

After we opened our family gifts at home, we packed up and headed to my parents’ house for Christmas with my immediate family. We loved our day of spending time with the family and letting the cousins play all day. 

The next day, we had Christmas with Ryan’s immediate family. We hadn’t seen both sides of our families since Thanksgiving, so it was really nice to spend some time with them. This is the extent of our Covid bubble right now, and even them we don’t see as often as we’d like. I’m just glad we live close now so we at least have the option to see them at all!

The kids LOVE their cousin time!

It was definitely a different Christmas than we are used to, but it was perfect. We loved our time with family and we loved taking it easy and just focusing on each other and Jesus…the best gift of all!

New Year’s Eve

The last few years, we have enjoyed just staying home and taking it easy for New Year’s Eve…so this year was obviously no different! Ryan had to work, so the kids and I had some New Year’s fun. We played board games, “Just Dance” on Nintendo Switch, and did a “countdown” with sparkling grape juice…all before 9pm! Since it was just us, there was no point in trying to keep the kids up. I barely made it to midnight myself! Ryan got home at 11:58pm…just in time to watch the ball drop with me!

The best thing to come out of 2020…my precious little Brody!

Brody is 7 months!

This precious little ball of sunshine is 7 months old! He is the absolute best blessing to come out of 2020. He has brought us so much joy during a difficult time in the world, and because of that I will always be grateful for the year 2020. 

Here is what our little guy is up to at 7 months…

• He still army crawls like a beast. And when he really wants something, he goes fast!
• He is starting to get up on his hands and knees. You can tell he wants to start crawling the real way, but he knows he can go faster with his army crawling!
• He snorts when he laughs.
• He crinkles his nose when he smiles big.
• He has very strong legs. When I’m changing his diaper, he’ll kick his legs like crazy and sometimes gets me in the stomach and knocks the wind out of me! 
• He is starting to pull up on things.
• He loves playing with anything the kids play with. Particularly Brax’s dinosaurs.
• He is still a major mama’s boy. If I’m not holding him, he will chase me around the room. If I walk passed him without picking him up, he melts. If I am sitting with him while he plays on the floor, it doesn’t matter if he’s surrounded by toys, he just wallers all over me. I’m sure there are lots of other 2020 babies who are attached to their mamas since they don’t get out much and see other people!
• He has been trying lots of different types of food (real food – not just baby food). He always wants us to feed the pieces to him. He’ll pretend to try to pick up pieces on his own, then just opens his mouth for us to feed him! 
• We’ve also been introducing him to high-allergen foods, like peanut butter and eggs, and so far he has done great with no allergies (yay!) He loves avocados, blueberries, and mixed veggies…but his absolute favorite thing so far is peanut butter. I can’t blame him!

Loving on his brother and sister. They are still obsessed with him. We all are!

Enjoying some avocados

Pulling up. Not sure I’m ready for this!

Brody LOVED his first Christmas! He especially loved scooting over to the Christmas tree when we weren’t looking and grabbing the bows off the presents and grabbing any ornament he could reach!

Happy Brody faces are my favorite!!

Our growing boy!

And that’s a wrap for our December, AND 2020. What a crazy year it was! I knew it was going to be a big year with a baby coming, finishing residency and moving…but I had no idea just how big it would be. We grew SO much this year and all became stronger individuals and as a family. God really gave me a good, strong dose of humility with this pandemic, which I know I needed. I am not in control, He is…and I need to trust his plan instead of trying to make my own. We are excited to see what 2021 brings…especially moving into our new house! We are also hopeful for a less eventful year…and we are definitely hopeful for this pandemic to end sometime this year. However, we’ve learned with this year that no matter what comes our way, we can handle it together as a family, and definitely with the Lord on our side!

Here is our 1 Second Everyday for December…

 

And if you are interested, here is the 1 Second Everyday of the entire 2020. It is pretty entertaining!

Christmas With Two

We love Christmas time around here, and having two children for the first time this Christmas season was double the fun! Christmas is practically a month long with all the festivities that come with it, and with all of that, we are very adamant about remembering why we are celebrating Christmas in the first place. Now that Kinsie is old enough to understand, we really tried to make the birth of Jesus the focus throughout the Christmas season. As a result of this, she became obsessed with Baby Jesus! She got super excited every time she saw a Nativity scene, and constantly sang songs about Baby Jesus. Of course she still got excited about Santa, Christmas lights and presents, but she at least seemed to understand the real meaning of Christmas (to the extent that a 3 year old can understand it). There was a lot that went on this month, so here were some of our favorite Christmas activities this month…

Breakfast with Santa Party

Kinsie’s cousin Emery had her 3rd birthday party at the beginning of the month, and it was a “Breakfast with Santa” party. It was so cute and so much fun! Santa came and each kid got to sit on his lap and take pictures with him. Like on the Polar Express, Kinsie was very shy, but excited to see Santa. Brax was all smiles like usual!

Meeting Santa

I have always said that I would never force my kids to visit Santa and sit on his lap and get a picture of them crying…I would only take them if they wanted to see him. Last year was the first year that Kinsie really could have a choice, and she wanted to meet him. Same with this year, and Brax is still young enough that he doesn’t seem to care either way. We visited the same Santa we did last year, he is a great one! Both the kids did great!

Christmas Music Program

Kinsie’s preschool had a Christmas music program this month. They have been practicing their songs for quite a while now, so Kinsie had been singing them to me at home constantly. She particularly liked the song “Oh What a Special Night,” which is about Baby Jesus being born and all the animals in the manger singing to Him for His birthday. It is a precious song, and luckily her cousins knew it too…so they later sang it on the beach in Florida! Kinsie did awesome in her program! She sang all the words, (we could even hear her among all the voices) and did all the motions. It filled my heart with so much joy to see her singing so excitedly about Jesus!

Christmas Eve at Aunt Renata’s

The last few years we have done pretty much the same Christmas Eve and Christmas Day routine. On Christmas Eve morning we eat breakfast at Ryan’s parents’ house and open gifts with them, then go to Christmas Eve service, then to Ryan’s Aunt Renata’s house for dinner and gifts. This is always a highlight, as we love spending time with everyone in the family. Kinsie seemed to love opening gifts even more this year because now she got to help Brax open his as well! Brax of course enjoyed his gifts, but seemed more interested in the ribbons and boxes! Both of the kids slept the whole ride home that night and went right to bed when we got home. We still left out milk and cookies for Santa though so they could see if he ate them in the morning!

Christmas Morning at Home

If you recall, last year I woke up on Christmas morning feeling terribly ill. I spent the entire day vomiting, so I didn’t get to enjoy watching Kinsie see what she got from Santa and opening all her gifts. I prayed that we all stayed healthy this year for Christmas, and I did have a sinus infection, but I would take that any day over the stomach flu! The kids were so excited this year to see what Santa brought them. The main gift that Kinsie wanted was the game Hungry Hungry Hippos, so she was thrilled to see it when she woke up! She also got a fishing game, a talking minion, and a hippo shirt. Brax was excited about his Mickey puppets, dinosaur teething toy, and elephant rattle!

Christmas Day at Papa and Yaya’s

Another tradition…after opening gifts with our individual families, we always meet at my parents’ house for brunch and gifts. Last year we had 3 kids opening gifts, and this year we added 2 more to the mix! Brax and Kolly couldn’t do a whole lot of the opening on their own, but the three older cousins came to their aid. It was Christmas chaos all morning and we loved every second of it. The kids were all so happy opening their presents and just being together. After all the gifts were open, we stayed for a while and the kids opened all their new toys and games and played with all of them. It was a perfect day spent entirely in our pajamas and enjoying each other’s company.

Kinsie got a ton of hippo related gifts this year, which is funny since she has been obsessed with the song “I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas.” She indeed got a hippopotamus for Christmas…or a few for that matter! Our boy Brax also had a wonderful first Christmas!

It was a wonderful month of December, and we had so much quality family time. It is times like this that we really realize how blessed we truly are. Christmas with two kids certainly added another level of chaos, but I wouldn’t have it any other way and I can’t wait to see the joy on the kids’ faces year after year on Christmas.

Baby’s First Christmas

As a child, Christmas is one of the most exciting times of the year. You can’t wait until Christmas morning to see if Santa came, and what he brought you. This was the first year that I got to celebrate Christmas as a parent, and it is just as exciting in a completely different way. Even though Kinsie is only 3 months old, we had a blast playing with her and watching her react to all her new toys that she got for Christmas. She has become so much more responsive and interactive lately, so she actually enjoyed her new toys and visiting all of her relatives.

Ryan and I are always busy during holidays with both of our families and we always try to make our rounds to spend quality time with each family. A few days before Christmas, we got together with my mom’s side of the family which is always a blast. My aunts and cousins always love spending time with Briggs and the babies. On Christmas Eve, Ryan, Kinsie and I went to Ryan’s parents house for breakfast and to open gifts. Kinsie got some awesome gifts, including some blocks that her Aunt Megan made with letters, bible verses, and pictures of all the people in Kinsie’s life. She will have a blast playing with those and recognizing everyone as she gets older! After gifts, we went to the Christmas Eve service at Traders Point. It was an amazing service! At one point, they invited all the kids on stage to dance around with glowsticks singing Little Drummer Boy. It was awesome and very powerful! Right from church we went straight to Ryan’s aunt’s house (his dad’s side) for dinner and gifts. Finally from there, we went to my parents’ house to eat dinner and exchange gifts with Ryan Robinson’s family. Busy, but wonderful day with family!

 

Kinsie enjoying her time opening gifts with Ryan’s family

The Matthews family on Christmas Eve

Hangin with daddy!

 

Fun cousin time

On Christmas morning, I was so excited to be Santa Claus! I woke up before Ryan and Kinsie to set everything up. Like I said before, it was almost as exciting as it was when I was a kid! Our little family opened our gifts, then we ventured back to my parents’ to exchange gifts with them and Krista, Ryan and the kids. We all ate breakfast while Kinsie and Kerigan took a Christmas morning nap in their car seats on the dining room table together. The best part about opening gifts was watching Briggs’ face when he received a train set from his Bapa and Yaya (his name for my parents). His key phrase for the day was “Open it!” As a kid, you think there is nothing better than getting gifts on Christmas, but watching the children you love open their gifts comes pretty darn close!

We got to hang a special new stocking this year!

Santa came!

   

Kinsie opening her gifts from Santa, mommy and daddy

Me and my sweet girl

 

Hanging out with dad watching her cousin Briggs open his gifts

The boys checking out Briggs’ new train set

Kerigan was worn out after opening gifts!

Finally in the afternoon on Christmas day, we went to another one of Ryan’s aunts house (his mom’s side) to celebrate Christmas with them. Kinsie got to meet her new cousin, Emery and they just so happened to be wearing the same outfit! Kinsie had a lot of fun playing with her aunts and cousins, then took a nice little nap in mommy’s arms. What a life!

Kinsie with her new cousin, Emery in their matching outfits

Overall, we had a wonderful Christmas. Ryan and I are so blessed to have so many people to share the holidays with. I can’t wait to watch Kinsie grow each year and teach her the true meaning of Christmas. When I was growing up, my family and I had a Christmas Eve tradition of reading the Christmas story in the Bible before going to bed. It was a great reminder of why we celebrate Christmas and to remember how lucky we are to have a God that loves us so much that He had his son be born of a woman, placed in a manger, go through life as a child, an adolescent, and then a man, just to be killed on a cross to pay for our sins. I would love to carry on this tradition with my children so they don’t get too wrapped up in the hype of Santa Claus and presents, and they remember the reason for the season!

Merry Christmas from the Matthews family!