It went so quickly!

My husband made it home for Christmas. I had to have a friend get him from the airport as my van would not start...it was frozen because of below zero temps for to long. I had run it the day before but it was -20 air temp that caused it to not want to start.

We have been snowed in on and off this year. We have to go down a huge hill that drifts terribly when the wind blows from the north. As I look out my window now, I cannot open the front gate as the drift is over 1/2 way up....Today I will have to dig it out, or go thru the drifts out back to get it.

Hubby left Thursday to go back to school for another 6 weeks. If he has to do this again, I think I will ask him to make it in the summer. Yesterday it snowed, no we had a blizzard, I could not see out 50 ft out of my window. Had he been scheduled to leave, we would not have made it to the airport on time, if at all.

Christmas was a nice day! The kids were up at 6:30, I think I was more excited for them than they were. We opened presents, and the thrill of the legos and starwars for the boys and the Pet shop for the princess were incredible. My eldest (28) cooked dinner while I helped assemble the legos kits. (I think I will put this on my list for next year...I enjoyed it as much as the kids) My SILs sent some paper star wars models for the 8 year old, he was able to complete the clone mask, but R2D2 and the AT TE walker were to much for him so I completed them. He was thrilled.

My mother, sister and 2 nephews came up. In the past we always held Christmas at my mothers as my dad was disabled..in a wheelchair and it was easier on him. Now we are feeling our way through new traditions and routines, and it looks like my place will be the house of choice as my mom lives next door to me so my sister is the only one who has to travel. Dinner turned out incredible.

My mom and my sister both looked thru the kids Christmas books (we did a huge lapbook that consisted of the 12 days of Christmas, the nativity, and some worksheets on history of traditions, like St. Nicholas, fact vs fiction, why we have apples on the thee, reindeer (no they don't really fly). The kids were thrilled to have someone interested.

Because this is new ground for me hosting, I have already started a notebook for next year, things I want to include, traditions to implement etc. even a schedule to get things done. I have not written a christmas letter since my father died and want to start doing that again as I do so enjoy recieving them from others. There were so many things I wanted to do but could not find the time.

The tree is now down, I even inventoried the items we have and hit the sales to fill in what we needed. Today a good after Christmas clean....