I have tried to post this twice and lost it both times. This is the third attempt and it gets significantly shorter every time. The twins are now up and so I am moving to semi-list mode:
Two weeks into the "on the tree" challenge:
SUCCESSES:
1. Scheduled 3 days to set up the tree, instead of 1 that inevitably turns into a frustrating 3.
Lessons learned-- Expectations and time frames make a huge difference. Fred should always string the lights. Good Christmas music is a boon.
2. Bought Christmas cards, instead of making them by hand (an irony since handmade is supposed to be more from the heart, but with our busy lives it has become another stress for me).
Lesson learned-- "To every thing there is a season."
3. Took family pictures in sepia, so I didn't have to find or buy coordinating outfits.
Lesson learned-- It doesn't matter what we wear our friends and family will still know we love them .......and family pictures are still going to be stressful :)
MISSTEPS:
1. Tried to take family pictures an hour before Jordan left for Rexburg in 40 degree weather, bad lighting, with an automatic setting on the camera and silly teenagers. Twenty three shots later Jordan reminded me that if this tradition was going to be "on" the tree, not "under" the tree, the experience, not just the picture had to be a positive memory. So, the 23rd picture was the last.
Lesson learned-- Have a professional photographer take your family pictures when you have a whole day, it's warm and there is something fun waiting for you as incentive afterward.
2. Still teetering with the distraction of my "perfect" gift disease and focusing on what is important.
Fred is in San Antonio, Texas for the 5th day and doesn't come home until tomorrow. WE MISS HIM! He says that surrounded by thousands of people, he's never felt so lonely. Saturday night it seems the whole hotel was drunk so he went out after dinner to get some fresh air and sanity and found it in a homeless man named Kenny. I'm grateful for being consistently re-directed to the true meaning of Christmas by Fred and good music and firesides. I loved the First Presidency devotional last night. I would love to be there some year live, but even over satellite tears came to my eyes every time the tabernacle choir starting singing, "...Wonderful!.." in "Unto Us A Child Is Born". Beautiful!
I can't concentrate with the twins swinging (sometimes I think literally) from tree to tree, so I either go be a full time homemaker and mother of these high maintenance monkeys or the house will fall down and this entry will start to reflect wicked stepmother" tendencies.
I can't get any of my pictures to download, so I'll have to update that part of this post when Mikayla gets home.
Two weeks into the "on the tree" challenge:
SUCCESSES:
1. Scheduled 3 days to set up the tree, instead of 1 that inevitably turns into a frustrating 3.
Lessons learned-- Expectations and time frames make a huge difference. Fred should always string the lights. Good Christmas music is a boon.
2. Bought Christmas cards, instead of making them by hand (an irony since handmade is supposed to be more from the heart, but with our busy lives it has become another stress for me).
Lesson learned-- "To every thing there is a season."
3. Took family pictures in sepia, so I didn't have to find or buy coordinating outfits.
Lesson learned-- It doesn't matter what we wear our friends and family will still know we love them .......and family pictures are still going to be stressful :)
MISSTEPS:
1. Tried to take family pictures an hour before Jordan left for Rexburg in 40 degree weather, bad lighting, with an automatic setting on the camera and silly teenagers. Twenty three shots later Jordan reminded me that if this tradition was going to be "on" the tree, not "under" the tree, the experience, not just the picture had to be a positive memory. So, the 23rd picture was the last.
Lesson learned-- Have a professional photographer take your family pictures when you have a whole day, it's warm and there is something fun waiting for you as incentive afterward.
2. Still teetering with the distraction of my "perfect" gift disease and focusing on what is important.
Fred is in San Antonio, Texas for the 5th day and doesn't come home until tomorrow. WE MISS HIM! He says that surrounded by thousands of people, he's never felt so lonely. Saturday night it seems the whole hotel was drunk so he went out after dinner to get some fresh air and sanity and found it in a homeless man named Kenny. I'm grateful for being consistently re-directed to the true meaning of Christmas by Fred and good music and firesides. I loved the First Presidency devotional last night. I would love to be there some year live, but even over satellite tears came to my eyes every time the tabernacle choir starting singing, "...Wonderful!.." in "Unto Us A Child Is Born". Beautiful!
I can't concentrate with the twins swinging (sometimes I think literally) from tree to tree, so I either go be a full time homemaker and mother of these high maintenance monkeys or the house will fall down and this entry will start to reflect wicked stepmother" tendencies.
I can't get any of my pictures to download, so I'll have to update that part of this post when Mikayla gets home.
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