Merry Christmas 2023

Oh Holy Night! I love that song, now even more after the MCO concert. I still get tears in my eyes when thinking about the youth sinking to their knees at the one command in the song. Here it is Christmas Eve, surrounded by our family and the Ostlers, still family. Christmas came way too fast, that week needed to be twice longer. 

I used the first day and a half to catch up on photo editing, cleaning, and relaxing. Everett and Phillip assembled one of the K’nex sets Miekka gave us a couple months ago. That project took Everett 2 days to build. Nampa is stuffed in a dreary inversion, “Baaaaaaaaarty, you bad boy” is finally loose. The weather really affects Everett, he is quite sensitive to dreary weather. He had a rough few nights with a “sinking” feeling in his gut. He was unable to sleep well for 3-4 nights. We had many talks about the cause of his feelings. Poor guy was very emotional for about 5 days. My best guess is he is dealing with: 

1. Seasonal Affective Disorder
2. Lack of exercise
3. Thrives on the activity at school
4. Feels guilty about playing on his computer, even when I allow him to
5. Growing hormones
6. Anxiety, he creates the nerves and ramps himself up before he can even try to sleep.  

We tried several changes in his routine like walking the dog, taking brain breaks, using calming music at night, vitamin d, and using a therapy light. 

Justin suggested we go look at Christmas lights on Monday. Fergus was very excited to join the excursion in the seat of honor, my lap. He smeared nose juice all over the windows and dash. Justin DJ’d the music while we drove out to the Bayhill neighborhood. The weather is so mild the mood is not very Christmassy. Once again the favorite house was the Star Wars house, this year with a Death Star on the roof. On the way back home Becky called asking when Amelia was coming, shoot! I forgot about her piano lesson. She reluctantly found a 30 minute spot on Thursday for her. 

The boys played Roblox a few times with Ronald (AZ friend). While cleaning the girl’s room I heard Phillip saying the most random things. One phrase just tickled my funny bone: “Ronald, what if there were 5 million pounds of potatoes at the Jamaican border?” I immediately thought, Jamaica’s border is water, potatoes? Is this code? He is always spouting off weird phrases, so it’s mostly normal to us, I can’t imagine what an outsider must think! 

Thursday morning I made a large batch of Chex Mix. The kids and I drove up to Eagle for a visit to Justin’s new office at Cascadia. Fergus came along dressed in his dapper dog sweater. He was the star of the show instead of our cute babies, how time changes. It wasn’t long ago when we invaded Cabela’s with our crew of 5 babies. Josie took Justin’s pen hostage, hid it under an accessory tray. She left a ransom note: I stole/hid your pen….evil smiley face. Next day Justin called me asking Everett to tell him where his favorite pen was hiding. JOSIE was thrilled! I divulged the location with Josie muhahahaing in the background. Phillip discovered Justin’s chair could morph into a machine gun chair, both boys were converting the chair into all sorts of weapons. We had a quick lunch at McD’s. Josie played three songs with Mrs Jessica at the Rest Home in Nampa. I love that idea of having kids perform for the elderly. Josie played Joy to the World, Up on the Housetop, and Hickory Dickory Doc accompanied by me on piano and Jessica on violin. We rushed home so Mia could make her 30 minute lesson to Becky. I ran to Walmart one last time. 

Amelia was scheduled to get her Patriarchal Blessing on Tuesday at 6. I called to confirm only to find the date was changed to Thursday at 6. I called the patriarch on our way up to Eagle asking if we could move the time to 5:30 since I had another commitment at 7. Slipped my mind to text Justin the change in time. The rest of the afternoon was back to back errands and chaos. I barely made to back to the house at 5:15 to pick up Mia. Still did not text Justin the change. We visited with Patriarch Norman Holm for a few minutes. I learned Sister Holm knew both Esther and Fawn! We relished the small talk about both ladies. Amelia and the Patriarch spoke for a moment in the next room before the blessing began. A couple phrases stuck out to me: Amelia is blessed with the gift of creativity, leadership, and the gift of ministering! She is a pure, bright light to those around her. We both left feeling full of God’s love. I especially reveled in knowing that Amelia knows how aware HE is of her and aware of her struggles and progress. Amelia was grateful for that knowledge as well. Justin got to the appointment right on time, at least the original time. He was crushed. Broke my heart when he asked if I think so little of him as a Father that I couldn’t even let him know about the time change. I felt terrible, my spines poked out and I disguised my guilt with gruffness. He was hurt deeply by our non communication. I rushed back out the door for an MCO Christmas party at Jenn Spackman’s home. 

Danielle drove Heather Bird and I out to Eagle for the event. We had a snacks and a little white elephant exchange. I brought one of my favorite Pannetone cakes for my contribution. Most of the ladies had never tried the cake and loved it. There were 4 cranberry appetizers, tis the season. Kami suggested we each share a favorite memory about MCO. Jenn started us off with a silly story about Brett’s undies hanging out in the youth chorus’ holding room, he calmly claimed said undies without a blush. Most stories told how folks found MCO and what drew them to stay and later donate time and talents to the organization. I had no idea Abbey was the one to really build the program and management in Idaho…while having little babies at home. The story I loved the most was that those who stay to volunteer are movers and shakers, we have to do in order to thrive. Yep, that sounds like my MO. I organized a gift exchange game with my spin-the-dial phone game. I enjoyed making silly categories, like open a gift like Brett, throw your hair like a conductor, sing for the best gift, and make other people exchange gifts. I learned Bergen collects muumuu’s! The best gifts were: a set of ornaments made out of blue tape (used to tape lines on the floor), a polyester muumuu, and 20 gifts cards with only 1 that had money on it.  

Amelia and I wrapped most of the presents while watching Little Women! It was very nice to have a small haul this year. I finished up the wrapping on Saturday after grabbing a couple more gifts to round out the distribution. Justin took the kids on a truck ride to Pickle Butte while I finished the dredges of Christmas preparation. Dad Lance organized a family zoom meeting for 7 pm on Friday evening. Each family had 10 minutes to tell a favorite Christmas tradition, favorite part of the Christmas story, and share a song. The song did not work out, some settings on zoom prevented singing from coming through clearly. I enjoyed seeing everyone! 

Poor Amelia was so sick on Friday, she felt dizzy, nauseous, had a head cold, and ear ache all at once. She stayed home from Christmas Caroling Saturday night. Poor kiddo was crying in bed when we got back because Fergus kept barking each time she tried to fall asleep. Caroling was fun! I used Grandma’s caroling books, jingle bells, and rhythm sticks as props. Kyle dressed up as Santa to hand out candy canes while we sang. Everett was grateful for an excuse to get out and sing his little heart out. I stayed up late making cherry cookies and my favorite soft gingerbread cookies. Amelia stayed up to keep me company for part of the night. Those cherry cookies, mmmm, mmmm! 

Nnylatter graduated to a true Nelf this year. He caught sight of a bigger Nelf on an errand and decided it was time to join the ranks. He sent Santa a message, you mean to tell me all these years that was really you? Yep! I was really Santa. Nnylatter earned a glitter shower and his pointy ear hat. He immediately went on a Nelf errand, passed that obstacle with flying colors. 

Christmas Eve day was lovely. We had sacrament meeting and a lovely Christmas program. The choir sang some seriously hard songs. We felt edified by the stories and songs shared. Sara and Dusty hosted a fondue party right after church. I brought white chocolate fondue, cheese fondue, and challah bread. We had a party frying meat and dipping all the things into cheese or chocolate. Josie is a carnivore, she ate about 15 pieces of meat. After “lunchner” I worked on prepping all the pieces for our traditional Christmas Eve. The clam chowder was a bit lack luster this year, we were all too full from fondue. The Ostlers joined us for the Nativity play, with Ambree and Amelia as costume mistresses. We sang hymns and listened to the story in Luke and Matthew. My favorite part was singing with the kids while waiting for the Nelves to drop off PJs! We sound pretty darn good. The Nelves waited until 9:30 to come this year. Josie screamed when she found a Hufflepuff zippy PJ and Evelyn was exceedingly happy to have a Ravenclaw version! The older kids got Star Wars lounging PJs. At the very bottom of the bag we found a package for Fergus, he got his own PJs! Awwwww. 

The Nelves and Santa were very busy Christmas Eve! They got all the fun gifts laid out nestled under the tree ready for opening. I went to bed knowing that when we woke up the cookie plate would be empty, a Santa letter waiting, Santa gifts laid out, and gifts under the tree. The stockings were carefully stuffed to the brim and set out next to bedroom doors. It was a magical night. Josie had a very hard time sleeping! She peeked out her door at 1:30 am to find stockings waiting at her door! She crawled into bed with Evelyn just so Santa would not leave with his task unfinished. 

We got the wake-up call at 7:30 am! I am grateful the kids love sleeping. I brought up Fergus, Santa filled his stocking with goodies too. Each kid got a fun toy called a zip string, it seems like a fun toy. The best stocking stuffer was a box of Kawaii slime, Josie got Nelf slime. Josie’s stocking had a girl Elf on the Shelf with a note attached that said her name was Rose. Josie jumped up and down yelling about Santa somehow knowing she wanted an Elf named Rose! That was magic. We headed downstairs, Josie led the pack. She found a remote controlled carriage…with a Bluey squishmallow stuffed inside?! Squeals! Evelyn had a Rainbow High studio and a Bluey Squishmallow! Amelia scored an Ahsoka Lego, Phillip an Endor Lego, and Everett had a puzzle box. Justin made me unwrap his gifts! He got me a legit telescope AND a pan set. My pans were falling apart, so that was a thoughtful gift. I got Justin some fun t-shirts and a car stereo. Most of the gifts were family gifts making a Nintendo Switch Oled fantasia, not just one BUT two switches! 

Phillip threw up a little while after breakfast, he spent 7 hours in bed napping from 2-9 pm. I also woke up feeling like my hips were on fire (strange symptom) and a brewing sinus infection. Essentially, we were out of action until Wednesday. Most of the day the kids spent playing the new games on the switches. I hear the Bluey game is really fun. We played a few rounds of Mariokart. I was not feeling well at all so did not make any Christmas dinner. We did do our Ostler gift exchange around 2 pm. Phillip got Carson the same stretchy hot dog I gave Phillip last year. Oh how we all laughed. I love that we did that this year. Josie loved the Keeper-Uppey game Dusty gave her. I played several rounds with her. Justin got my telescope set up. IT was a clear sky!!!! Yippee! Calibrating the scope was very tricky, we never got it set up. We got to see the full moon in all its Christmas glory. I found Jupiter, we could see 4 moons reflecting light around the planet. We all went to bed relatively early, feeling under the weather in one form or another. Merry Christmas!