Christmas Memories with the Babies

Christmas has come and gone. Another year of memories made. Christmas is like that. One always remembers Christmas. It is usually not the memories that we anticipate having, but the wonderful spontaneous memories that we make. Take Christmas brunch for example. I purchased or rather had Eric purchase fresh roses for the table and I pre-made a Christmas Breakfast casserole to eat altogether for breakfast in the dining room on my beautiful Christmas dishes while recounting blessings of the past year. I have actual Christmas memories of doing just this in years past with Laura and Kristen, but now we have 3 additional children, 2 spouses, 2 young grandchildren and 3 dogs collectively. Instead, we ate standing up in the kitchen at all different times, taking turns to watch Lucy or hold Wyatt so Laura and Kristen could eat. I'm not sure where the flowers were and I don't even recall blessing the food before we ate! Instead Jason read the Christmas Story from the Jesus Storybook Bible to Lucy before opening gifts. We listened too.

Dinner was late also but spectacular with my first ever beef tenderloin and Laura's amazing Southern Living's 5 Layer Red Velvet White Chocolate Cheesecake for dessert. That child of mine loves a challenge! We did make it to the dining room and even went around recounting blessings of the past year. Better late than never!

The same held true for the Christmas Eve service. I neglected to register Lucy for childcare so she sat in the service with us on the second row for maximum exposure. Somehow Laura and Jason armed with a  bag of tricks and genuine creativity managed to amuse Lucy along with the leftover juice in Laura's communion cup. I feel the Lord will understand and forgive her. Laura later said that she immediately started strategizing which distractions to take out when, saving the best treats for the sermon portion of the service. Lucy was heading over to wake peacefully sleeping 4 week old cousin Wyatt, when the service ended just in time. Whew! Exhausting for Laura and Jason, but a wonderful Christmas memory to have our newest family members with us in the service. And Lucas did great lighting the Advent candle.

I discovered it's handy to have people of all ages and lots of them around to entertain the babies. Lucas and Lucy deepened their affection for one another as he holds nothing back to amuse his little niece. He never tires of entertaining her and she never tires of being entertained, the perfect combination! I did nab some alone time with Lucy to play a fun game of peekaboo with her and give her a bath while everyone else went to a movie. Afterward, with her sippy cup of milk, she relaxed with me while we watched a bit of Pretty Woman. Is that bad? Regardless, a memory I will treasure.