Christmas (eve) Day

We had a great Christmas, which we celebrated on the 24th since I work all day on Saturdays. First thing in the morning we did the presents at home with just us. Really it was just the kids having a ball, and Afa and I watching them have fun, because Afa and I don't do gifts for each other. It was a lot of fun watching their reactions to all the presents. I got some really good pictures of Ariana's facial expressions, but Gerry was just going "Oh! Awesome! Cool!" you can't really get that in a picture. Anela was just kind of in a daze most of the time. LOL!
This year I decided to save some money and have less waste and less mess by skipping the wrapping paper. It's kind of dumb to spend money on paper and 5 times as long wrapping as it takes to unwrap it all, and then you just throw it all away. So I just set up all their presents and put things together that required assembly. That way they just got to look over all their stuff and start playing with it right away. And they each had their HUGE stockings to empty out too. (We got the really nice huge stockings with all our names on them a couple of years ago from my mom)
After a couple of hours admiring their loot, we left for my dad's house. We had a fun time with Dad and Debbie and Genasee and Rich. My dad made some really good ham and funeral potatoes, and of course Genasee brought dessert, cookies, cupcakes and pie!! I didn't get many pictures there, but we had a great time. The kids got to open presents, but Anela only wanted to open 1. She liked the Cat in the Hat matching game so much, she refused to open any more! LOL! So we opened her other presents for her.
Gen and Rich made everyone Santa sleds out of wrapped candy and raisin boxes, way cute!

Gerry with his little "pet hamster" from gma and gpa. It makes noises and runs around on the ground.

Ariana with her "pet bunny"

Anela just wanted to relax and eat some chocolate, and watch the other kids have fun with their gifts. She's not a morning person, even when there are new toys!

What's gong on!?

Sharing her sucker with her new Dora doll from gma Bailey.

That's a good Christmas morning face!

Happy with her loot!

Happy boy

Showing Ariana his dinosaur book.

So excited about her box full of princesses. I was lucky to get the last one on the black friday sale at Target. 7 disney princess dolls.

Pajama Day

I got all the kids pjs to give to them on Christmas Eve, which for us this year will be Thursday since I work all day Saturday. Last night I decided that I would give Ariana and Gerry theirs a couple of days early, because they have pajama day today at school, and I thought that it would be fun for them to wear their new jammies. They both really like their new pjs. As you can see, Gerry's have lots of spots balls, and Ariana's have princesses and crowns. They still have new slippers that they will get on Thursday, and Anela will get her jammies and slippers then. We will be doing our main Christmas present opening on Friday morning, and then we will go to my dad's house around noon or 1, and spend time with him and Debbie, and my sister Genasee and her husband Rich.
I work all day Saturday, which I am actually glad about. I could have easily gotten the day off, but then I would have had to pick up hours some other day so that I don't go under hours. I figure that if I have to get the hours sometime, I might as well get them on a day that I will be getting time and a half pay the whole day! I don't really care about doing everything on the exact day, as long as we get to spend time together and have our holiday fun, and the kids
certainly are not complaining about getting Christmas a day early! I will also be working on New Years day, which is another paid holiday. I was very happy when I worked out this trade with my friend so that I would only work Saturdays. (I am at work for 15 hours, but only 13 hours are paid, but at least I get to stay home with the kids all week.) I was extra happy when I found out that both Christmas and New Years are on Saturdays, 2 days at over $20 in 2 weeks! It will help us save up for Afa's slow time. I am actually surprised that he is working all this week, and they don't look like they are slowing down yet, but you never know with his job. There have been times where he will go from working over time to no work at all from one week to the next. Usually January is his slowest time of year, but we'll see...........

Decorating Trees

Today I went and got 3 tiny trees for the kids to decorate for Christmas. I had decided that I didn't want to get a big tree because there really isn't room for one in our tiny apartment. I didn't even put up a tree last year, because the year before the kids had most of the decorations off the tree and lost before Christmas. I really wanted them to have the fun of decorating and having a tree this year though. I was going to go get a little 4 foot one that I had seen at Big Lots, but when I went back, they were gone. Then I saw these little 2foot trees, and decided that it would be fun for them each to have their own. And they are in really fun colors too! Anela's is purple, Ariana's is pink and Gerry's is red. They were really excited about it, and had a lot of fun with them. They aren't the prettiest Christmas trees ever, but they serve the purpose that I wanted them for perfectly. The kids love them, and are having a lot of fun admiring them with the lights off. It's nice to have something here to help us get into the holiday spirit.

Just a little update

I just wanted to do a quick little post since I get annoyed at others for not posting when I want to see what's going on with them. Since the whole reason for this is to keep in touch with people we don't get to see much, here is what's going on in our part of the map.

I am going crazy!!

I have had problems with anxiety and depression most of my life, though I didn't realize exactly what it was til after Gerry was born. The doctor gave me some medication at that time, but I really didn't like it, so I have been working on controlling it without medication. Most of the time I do pretty good, but of course there are good days and bad days (or weeks). Lately I have been having major flare ups of both. I have been having a hard time with my car, it seems like everything is wrong with it. I had to get it registered in October, but it took til mid November to actually get it done, because so much needed to be fixed on it. Luckily Kirah's husband Jeremy did a lot of the work for me. I am so grateful for what he did for me. He spent 3 days of a 4 day weekend working on my car! After it was road worthy and registered, it decided that it just didn't want to start anymore! The battery kept dying for no apparent reason. I would drive it to the store, and when I got back to it, it would be dead. And no, I wasn't leaving the lights on or anything else stupid. I took it to the mechanic and he said that he can't find anything wrong with it! So I just have to drive it around and hope that it starts when I need it!
There has been a lot of sickness going around, and we have gotten most of them, so there hasn't been much time that there isn't at least one of us sick with something. The latest affliction is a stomach flu, so I have been spending a lot of time cleaning clothes, blankets, rugs and the floor of throw up from kids who don't get to the toilet fast enough. (or in one case throwing up on the rug while sitting on the toilet!)
I feel stressed out because I have been going through all of this feeling pretty much like a single mother. Afa is working a lot which is great, but he has not worked in town since September. He has only been home about 24 hours out of every week, and half of that is while I am at work! I am grateful for his job, because it pays the bills so that I don't have to work much, or worry about who is taking care of my kids, but it is hard to have him away so much.
OK, I better get back to my job, of getting the kids to sleep and cleaning the house.
Hopefully I will have something better worth posting about soon.