Christmas At Last!

I must begin this post with a confession... I was the first one up Christmas morning (before 7) and too excited to go back to sleep. I wanted to let Marc and the kids sleep as long as they wanted so I busied myself making cinnamon rolls. I had fully intended to make cinnamon rolls for us to have Christmas morning but by the time 11 PM rolled around on Christmas Eve I knew it was too late (the process takes several hours...) So I made the dough and then spent some much needed time cleaning my kitchen... By 8:30 the kids were awake (all of them were up before Marc!) and ready for Christmas. We all piled onto our bed to red the Christmas story. This year we enjoyed reading from Kinnick's bible, Sadie's bible, and my bible. I also had fun interviewing Sadie and Kinnick--I asked them questions about Jesus' birth and video taped their answers. Sadie answered most of the questions but Kinnick was quick to yell what gifts the wise men brought--I love hearing him say "frankincense". After we finished reading, we sang happy birthday to Jesus and then let daddy sneak down first with the video camera...

Sadie had fun organizing her brother and sister on the top of the stairs and giving them instructions about what to do when they went down.

I loved this Christmas morning! The kids were very excited, but they were also patient. I felt like we got to enjoy each part of our morning without rushing to the next. They were kind to each other and grateful for their gifts.

Santa Presents:

Sadie's Leapster

Kinnick's Mickey Mouse Clubhouse--he spends time every day playing with this playhouse!

Macey's Pink Stacking Rings

Stockings:

Sadie has been wanting this toothbrush for some time. She loved decorating with her name and stickers and has been brushing her teeth several times daily since Christmas!

Presents from Mom & Dad:

Ornaments:

For Kinnick, we chose a Micky Mouse Choo Choo ornament--he LOVES Mickey Mouse Club House (almost to the point where I can classify it as an addiction!) We also got him a glittery truck ornament because this year he has been fascinated with trucks.

Sadie got a tinkerbell. She loves anything princess or disney. She is constantly telling us stories about visiting Disneyland with her imaginary friends. She loves to play dress up and loves to wear princess pajamas. I have enjoyed introducing her to several disney princess movies this year including: Snow White, Aladdin, & Beauty and the Beast.

We had a hard time finding Macey's ornament. When I told Marc that I was thinking she needed something with a smile face, he laughed and told me he had been thinking the same thing. We choose this santa ornament because it was the closest to a smile face we could find. We loving calling her "Smiley Mace"--she always has a smile to share!

The kids got a box full of bath tub goodies (including finger paint) to share--they were so excited they wanted to take a bath right away. (After Kinnick helped daddy shovel snow with his new shovel, that is!)

That afternoon we drove to Mt. Sterling for my mom's family Christmas. We took the kids new game and they had fun playing with their cousins. We also let them take some of their new toys for the car ride. Sadie enjoyed her leapster and Kinnick enjoyed his tag jr. books. At the party they received pillow pets from my parents--they are a HUGE hit!

I feel so blessed with such a wonderful family... I've loved all the fun leading up to Christmas and Christmas day was great!

Christmas Eve

We had such a great Christmas Eve this year... I felt like it was so balanced with fun/presents and family/giving. I felt so blessed that Grandma & Grandpa Gorsch and Aunt Nee Nee were willing to keep the kids for the morning. I had the amazing opportunity of going to visit new moms in the Chicago Hospitals with a group from Ms. Pearl's. She has done this for the last 6 Christmas Eves and I've always wanted to go, but never had a great opportunity to do so.

I rode to Joliet with Marc (we left while everyone was still sleeping) and dropped him off then continued into Chicago. I joined a group of about 15 others (mostly high school and college students, but a few other adults). We rode around in a bus and visited 6 different hospitals (including Cook County and Rush Medical--two of Chicago's biggest!) At Rush we visited over 20 moms with new babies and several more in labor. I felt so blessed to be able to relate so easily to these moms! We were able to take them huge gift bags stuffed with blankets, clothes, diapers, wipes, lotion, powder, and lots more! We were also able to see their new babies and share with them about a baby God sent so many years ago. I was able to visit and pray with several Christian women and some who didn't know Christ. They were all extremely grateful for the gifts and the prayers. It is definitely something I would like to do again! (I also have to say a huge thank you to my wonderful husband who stayed at the bank for two hours after all his co-workers left while he was waiting on me to get back!)

When we got home we made lots of yummy junk food for our Christmas Eve. We had such a great time hanging out and playing! We let the kids open three presents that were for them to share. They got a new Wii game--Chuckie Cheese, another game--Hullabaloo, and a new Christmas video--Mickey Mouse Club House Saves Santa.

Right before bed we let the kids open their Christmas books!

Macey with her scratch and sniff Gingerbread Family book...

Kinnick got a "Look & Find" Santa book and Sadie got a book called "Christmas Angels". Her book shares the Christmas story from the view point of the angels. We read all the kids new books together before bed. (And I believe I have now read K's book over 50 times!)

Macey had fun hanging out with Daddy!

Sadie laid out all the stockings and set out the cookies and Christmas punch for Santa. We gave her lots of warning about not coming out of her room until we came to get her and she did great! Steph got up in the morning and told me that Sadie was awake. I went to get her and she was waiting patiently in her bed... with a BIG smile!

Christmas Begins...

Our first official Christmas Celebration this year was the DePauw Family Christmas on Saturday 12/18. The kids had fun playing with some of their 2nd cousins. This year we did a white elephant gift exchange game... the kids had one and the adults had one--we ended up with a dog bowl filled with very yummy puppy chow (me), a pink tool kit (Marc), a mickey mouse puzzle (Sadie), and a new stuffed puppy (Kinnick--but Sadie has stolen it from him!) It was a good start to our Christmas celebrations!

Last week Marc's parents and sister came for a few days. The arrived Thursday afternoon and stayed through Christmas morning. We did our Christmas with them on Thursday night...

The kids got lots of fun new gifts! In this last picture Sadie is showing off her color changing snowman ornament. Aunt Nee Nee chose this because she has a similar one that Sadie LOVES!

Christmas Miscellaneous

Sadie Sue: Aunt Trista got this Christmas tutu for Sadie... she wore it A LOT! I let her wear it to church one Sunday and to the DePauw family Christmas... she wore it around our house almost every day!! Thanks Aunt Trista :)

This is Sadie's pink Christmas tree that she has in her room. Marc got it for her last year (on clearance) and we saved it to give to her this year. I found some pink and silver ornaments for it and she took a few of her favorites off the big tree. She has really enjoyed having her own tree in her room!

Baking at Grandma Sue's (12/14-12/16):

I packed up the kids and we left for my parents when Sadie was done with school on Tuesday 12/14. We stayed through Friday and then went on to Burlington to meet Marc for some more traveling and Christmas activities. The kids and I had fun at my parents'. Trista, Jadyn, and Jaren came over both nights and we did LOTS of baking.

Jadyn and Sadie in their aprons. (Grandma Sue sent this red apron in a Christmas package for the kids. Sadie packed it and her pink one and happily shared!)

Jaren and Sadie licking out the bowl...

Decorating sugar cookies with icing and sprinkles...

Cousin Picture--can you tell who refused to pose?

Christmas Program at Church (12/18):

Sadie with her wand--they used these to sing "Twinkle Twinkle Christmas Star." Sadie performed two songs with her "Tot Music Choir"--they practice once a week and one song with her Sunday School Class. She had a lot of fun.

Sadie and her friend Emma enjoying cookies after the performance.

Gingerbread House (12/21):

Sadie's friend Mikenna spent the night last week. They've been asking for a sleepover for quite some time! This was Sadie's first official sleepover (aka--the other mom was not here) and they did pretty well. They were up past midnight giggling (I fell asleep on the couch waiting for them to fall asleep!)

Sadie has been asking me to get a gingerbread house for awhile... I usually wait until after Christmas to get one on clearance, but I found this one at Aldi for $3. The girls had a great time! Sadie really wanted to make it look exactly like the box--we tried our best!

Mikenna & Sadie

Ms. Jennifer's Christmas Party (12/23):

Presents!

Although my kids don't go to Ms. Jennifer's on a daily basis, she is still a big part of our lives. She tries to have them over once a week or every other week and occasionally has them for sleepovers (Kinnick got to go to his first sleepover last week!)

We made her a photo book listing the different reasons we love her... Sadie was very excited to give it to her!

Christmas Breakfasts

The first week of December I made pancakes with the kids--we typically make pancakes on Friday mornings... because it was the first Friday of December we decided to make "Christmas Pancakes". We were also enjoying having our trees up so I asked the kids if they would like to turn the lights off and enjoy the Christmas lights. We also lit a few candles on the table. Sadie loved this so much that she kept asking to have "Christmas Breakfast" again so I decided to do it every Friday of December... we enjoyed it so much that it may become a new tradition at the Gorsch house.


Each breakfast consisted of the kids helping me in the kitchen, candles & Christmas lights, holiday themed food, and talking about Christmas. As we ate breakfast together I asked the kids their favorite thing about Christmas... it varied every week depending on the weeks activities. Sadie's favorites included: decorating our tree, seeing Santa, getting presents, and building a snowman. Kinnick's favorites usually involved something about Santa. We also talked about why we celebrate Christmas and what kinds of things we can do to help show other people love during the Christmas season... with a little guidance they came up with some neat ideas (more on that later!)

Here are pictures from our special Christmas Breakfasts...
Friday 12/3... red pancakes with Christmas Sprinkles:

Friday 12/10... red and green monkey bread:

Friday 12/17... Breakfast with Santa (we were at my parents' house, so this worked out perfectly!

Sadie was excited to talk to Santa, but did not want to sit with him.

Kinnick was SO excited to see Santa (he did not even want to eat breakfast!)

Macey was not so thrilled with Santa this year... so here is her first picture with Santa!

Wednesday 12/22... I knew I was going to be gone Christmas Eve morning, so I improvised. We had our final Christmas Breakfast on Wednesday morning. Sadie's friend Mikenna had spent the night so she joined us. Cinnamon Rolls with red & green icing: