christmas with kids

From the time you find out you’re going to be a parent (or want to be a parent), you have these visions of how picturesque certain moments with your children will be. You imagine all of these amazing Norman Rockwell-esque photos you’ll have to cherish for a lifetime (and ~~brag about~~ show to all of your friends).

And, then you get real and realize nothing ever goes as planned when kids are involved.

The ever popular visit with Santa is a great case in point. In my OCD, over-planning mom mind, I see my two well-dressed girls politely walking up to Santa and having a great little conversation about how good they’ve been and what they’d really like for Christmas. Then they hop up on his lap for a great photo op where they both smile their best toothy grin and look right at the camera. That’s Christmas card gold.

Now, let me tell you how this year’s visit with Santa really went down. Somehow on the ride to Macy’s, their hair and outfits became all kinds of disheveled and we got stuck in a torrential downpour (not a good start). Somehow, we managed to arrive at a time when there was no line (hallelujah). As we walked up to Santa, our oldest cowered behind me and refused to look at or talk to Santa (even though she happily sat on his lap last year). Our youngest ran up to the glitter covered faux presents that made up the Santa set and tried to walk off with one. I mean I get it, why talk to the guy in the big red suit when you can just grab a present and run right?

After 3 ~~awkward~~ attempts, this is the photo we ended up with. Now, other than the vacant look on my youngest’s face, there’s really nothing wrong with this photo. It’s a very respectable photo to send out as our family Christmas card. But it’s not quite what I had in my mind as a vision of our family. And I really let that get to me instead of really just laughing it off and being in the moment with my family (which I’m really kicking myself for now).

I guess the moral of the story is those Norman Rockwell moments just don’t exist in the real world so don’t set your family (and especially your kids) up for failure. I mean we all want the perfect photo with Santa, but can you blame your child for screaming their head off when you try to set them on the lap of a stranger in a weird red suit and a crazy beard (who probably smells a little funky).

And when you look back at the photo of said screaming toddler years from now, you’re going to laugh and treasure that moment. So just enjoy the experience of the Santa visit with your family, whether you get the perfect photo or the most perfectly awkward photo. Your family is perfect no matter what. Like I’ve said before, it takes being reminded what is important to forget what isn’t.

Want to hear more about adventures with kids at Christmas? Check out this post about decking the halls with kids.

{Ho ho ho}

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I LOVE Christmas! It’s my absolute favorite time of the year! While I’ve always been a big fan of the holidays, now that I have two sweet little girls, it’s even more fun (and a big change from the old days).

Christmas BK (before kids) was all about holiday parties (fun cocktails and cute outfits), drinking ~~several bottles of~~ champagne on Christmas Eve, sleeping in on Christmas morning and gorging yourself on food and drink in the afternoon on Christmas Day.

Christmas AK (after kids) is all about holiday recitals, homemade ornaments, Elf on the Shelf, visits to Santa, assembling toys on Christmas Eve (with the help of champagne) and waking up REALLY early on Christmas morning to see what Santa brought this year (parents get no credit).

Despite the shift from old traditions to new, I love sharing holiday experiences with my family, like decorating our house and the tree.

I’m a very type A (on the verge of OCD) person and I like things to be done a certain way. I like color coordinated decorations, all white lights and not a lot of clutter. My children don’t seem to share the same design aesthetic as me. They don’t care that mom has a panic attack when there are two of the same color bulb right next to each other (I may or may not rearrange things after they go to bed). I’ve learned that in order to enjoy decorating the house with my children, I have to tell the OCD part of me to take a chill pill (or drink a glass of wine) and get over it.

We’ve also adopted a fake tree the past couple years in order to prevent any major toddler-induced tree disasters (because chewing on fake pine needles is so much better than real pine needles). I do miss the smell of a real tree, but not the mess and watering business.

Anyways, enough about me and my OCD tendencies. On to the sharing! And yes these photos were all taken in the dark to highlight the glowing effect of the white Christmas lights and downplay the cobwebs, dust and general messiness.

Our dining room doesn’t offer a lot of room for decorating, especially since anything sitting on the dining room table is free game to my girls (learned that from a game of catch with scented pine cones and Christmas ornaments). We usually keep our decor to the little shelf in the back of the room. This year it includes mini trees, a lantern, a cute Happy Holiday sign, and a basket of ornaments and scented pinecones, all strung with white lights.

Our mantel decor includes our family stockings, some faux garland, white lights and a few ornaments.

And now for the tree. I’ve let go of my color coordinated, Martha Stewart tree dreams and given into the chaos that is homemade ornaments and those we’ve collected from trips over the past few years. Breakable ornaments go on the top and those more kid-friendly plastic and homemade ornaments adorn the bottom (and get rearranged daily by my decorators-in-training).

The back is where I let my OCD self take control and hang the red and gold balls that don’t fit with the mish mash of ornaments on the front.

And of course you have to include a few ornaments for the husband (he was in charge of making ~~strong~~ warm cider cocktails during the tree decorating portion of the evening – such a good man). This leg lamp ornament (from Christmas Story) was a gift from me last year because I refused to get him an actual leg lamp (I have to draw the line somewhere people). He also loves the red and white Santa face ornaments that cover the front of our tree, the golf-tags-turned-ornaments from some of his favorite courses and the many Oregon Duck bowl game commemorative ornaments.

And how could I not include this photo of my little un-decorator. She loves taking the ornaments off and playing with them but hasn’t quite gotten the hang of how to rehang them (and that’s why the breakables go up top).