Christmas Eve/Christmas at our house

Christmas this year was difficult for me. I am used to setting a budget (Yes- I have a spreadsheet to keep track)- but I pretty much go a little over budget on almost everyone. Luckily- we have a holiday saving account which was a big help this year, but we not only had to reduce our budgets (Mainly Paige's, and ours), but I had to learn how to creatively stick to them. I want to spoil people so I really learned how to stretch that dollar. Ultimately we had a great Christmas and I think I did a good job at doing just that.

Christmas eve we ended up at my parents house in the late afternoon while we waited for the Boston Pidgeons to call us on Skype. They all gather at Christmas eve, and last year we started a gift exchange over the internet. It can be difficult at times, but it sure is fun. And my dad got the computer to show on the big screen so it was way easier to see everyone this year.

We ended up with a $25 Home Depot GC which Justin was, of course, thrilled with. But I had the Night Before Christmas book from Hallmark, read and recorded by my Nana and it was taken from me. I am glad that Maddy and the next little O'donnell with get to enjoy it, but am sad that Paige will not.

We went home and put Paige to bed. Santa came and dropped off a few stocking and a nice toddler size trampoline (Thank-you Craigslist!).Paige saw it first thing and tried to go and jump before we even took off the stockings!
We opened up stockings and some presents for Paige.



After we had fun playing around and enjoying the massive amount of stuff we already seemed to have, we headed over to my parents house. Chelsie wasn't feeling that good, but she was a trooper. We enjoyed opening more presents including a Nintendo Wii for Justin & Me!!!

Justin really loved this License plate!

We had a nice relaxing afternoon in our PJ's. Set up the Wii.

Christmas with Justin's Family

We are learning that with divorce comes changes. There are days that Daniel has his kids and days where Sarah has them. And Holidays are no exception to that rule. Dan won't have them every year on Christmas Eve. So even though Christmas Eve has been celebrated by the Huffman's for a long time, we learned how to be flexible this year. Plus, Dan's wife- Michelle was due with their first child together on 12/23/09. Since they were hosting the event, we thought it would be better to schedule it for the Saturday before Christmas.

Keith was able to drive the boys in from the mountains so we did not have to go and pick them up (Secretly I love spending that extra time with them- but it was nice to not have to spend and extra hour or so on the road with a 2 year old).

We had a wonderful- relaxing day. No extra traffic because of the Holiday. No rushing back to get to the skype call with my east coast family. It was an almost perfect day. We played with the kids, relaxed with Grandma. It was a blast opening up presents and watching the kids open theirs. And even though Lucus broke the marshmallow shooter about 2 seconds into playing with it- Family moments like these ones are priceless.

Christmas Train & Christmas Parties

A few weeks before Christmas, Denise & her family invited us to join them on the Sunol Train of Lights for their test run. They go every year and we had never been able to go before. I didn't really even know what the train of lights was. But when that train rolled into the station, I figured it out quickly. It was so neat, and Paige really had a great time. We had a little wine, some snacks and lots of warm clothing. Paige just loves to be social so she spent a lot of time chatting it up with Denise & Mike. Our friends Geoff and Ashley were able to join us too. I hope we get invited again next year. This is a tradition I would love to take part in.

Then a couple weeks later it was time for the Annual Sun-Maid Christmas party. My mom/dad took Paige for the night and we sure let loose. We closed the party down which I haven't done in years. I could have possibly had a few too many glasses of wine, but I had a lot of fun dancing the night away. Additionally I won a $50 American Express GC, and 4 sees candies gift certificates. I gave away 2 of the sees GC to some people at my table who didn't win a prize and gave my parents one for watching Paige. My coworkers really know how to have a good time.

Colleen, Me & Teresa

Surprisingly the next day, we were invited to the Chapmans annual Christmas Bash. Again, it was the first year we were able to go, but we hope to go for many years in the future. They know how to have a lot of fun, and we took part in the craziest gift exchange I have ever been to. Everyone opens a gift of their choosing. Once everyone has opened (We are sitting in a circle), they set a timer for 10 minutes. There were 3-4 trays with 2 dice each. Each person holding the tray rolls the dice one time trying to get doubles. If you do, you get to go steal the gift of your choosing. If you don't you pass it on to the left and wait for the next tray. It gets pretty crazy. There was a bottle of wine that was flying around the room, and the other item that was getting fought over was a bullhorn. It was loud, but so much fun. And Denise took a good family shot us us, which was nice.

Paige at 2 years old

I hage lots of things to post about Christmas Parties, Christmas itself and the birth of my new niece, but for now I just wanted to write down some things about Paige at 2 years old.

My mom got us the "Elf on a Shelf" last year so we started the tradition this year. We had to name the elf so we named him Egiap (Paige backwards). Paige just calls him "My Self" and she loved to find him.

She can count to ten- kind of. She normally starts with 3, but she usually makes it all of the way to ten.

She loves to hide. She wants to go under the blanket. Most of the time we are hiding from CLO-E who has no intention of finding us, but Paige just laughs and laughs.

She insists on having 3 blankets on her at bedtime. Sometimes she will ask for another blanket, but I usually stop at 3.

She has been working on jumping lately. She doesn't make it off the ground, but she sure tries.

You can almost always find her with her finger up her nose. We are still trying to figure out how to get her to stop.

She is very polite- she always says Thank-you. She is getting better at saying "Please". And she says "I'm Sorry" at really random times for no reason that we know of.

She "cooks" Justin bacon & eggs almost every morning at her play kitchen.

Everything is hers. It is "My ______" or "Paige's _______"

She just loves to be tickled which is having different parts of her body rubbed lightly. She especially loves her tummy, back, arms and legs. Sometimes she says "Tickle Me" and even if you are it is like you aren't doing it right.

She is very opinionated and will let you know what she wants and how you should do it.

Most of the time you can find her striking up conversations with random strangers, but sometimes she can get really shy.

Paiges visit with Santa

Paige does not particularly like Santa. When I took her to the mall for her 2 year pics I thought I would take her to see Santa. She was not having that. She hid in me and didn't even want to look at him. If we went into a store, she would be fine. But the 2nd she walked back into the mall she wanted to be picked up and hid again. Like she knew he was out there somewhere and he was going to find her. I thought about not putting her through the torture this year, but one day when Justin was bored with her at home- I told him to go ahead and take her. And it was worth it for the pictures. I put last years picture first for comparison.

Paige's Profession Christmas & 2 year old pics

Paige did so good for these pictures. At first she was like a little model and even stayed in the positions the photographer put her in. But by the time we got to the last outfit and the car, she pretty much just wanted to play. It was weird being there all by myself, and a lot harder to pick out pictures. Normally someone takes her to go ride the escalator or something while I pick them out. But we made it through, had lunch at subway and let her run around the mall some. Here are a few of my favorites from the day.

Paige's 2nd birthday Party

I apologize for being absent in my posting the last month. December really turned into quite the whirlwind and I just didn't have the energy. I had to write Thank-you letters, then get my Christmas Cards/Letters out and Christmas shop. Add a few parties and a few other events, work and a 2 year old- and you have exhaustion.

But this post is about Paige's 2nd Birthday Party which was quite a success. We had so much fun and were blessed to have so many people join us to celebrate! The party was Tinkerbell/Lost themed. We sent Tinkerbell invites to the girls (I haven't had time to scan them in but they were cute) and Lost Boys/Peter Pan invites to the boys. I found some great ideas on the Internet and put them into action with my own twist. I tried to keep it simple, but if you know me- things turned out to be a little grander than I originally anticipated.

We had cupcakes because I didn't have the energy to make a fancy cake. I was really glad that we still had our nephews around to help keep Paige busy and to help set-up/decorate. They were troopers and I could not have done it without them. And Thank-God our friend Danielle was early because I couldn't get the Tinkerbell candle to stay on the cupcake. She was able to give me some help (She is the best cake maker/decorator I know- she should have her own show on TLC or something).

We had a game for the adults- Guess the marbles- Winner won 2 movie tickets.

The kids had fun playing when they first arrived. Then we had them decorate their own "I SPY" telescopes and goodie bags.

Paige just loves to play I Spy.

The girls all got Fairy wings and tutu's that we bought at the dollar store and fancied up with some ribbon thanks to the artistic hand of my grandmother. The boys all got bandannas and Pirate Eye Patches as part of their goodie bag.


Then came the treasure hunt at the park across the street. The clues were on the easier side for the older kids, but it was fun to create and fun to watch. At the first stop they got some pixie sticks (or dust if you will) for their goodie bags. Then came some bubbles (Bobble from Tinkerbell). Then was some candy necklaces and poppers (Lost things). Lastly they headed back to our backyard where "Hook" had buried some gold coins in the sandbox. It was a lot of fun and such a beautiful day.

Justin dressed up as a pirate fairy- Gotta love that guy sometimes- he really cracks me up.

The kids played with Paige's kitchen and other toys for a little while. We had pizza and then we had the cupcakes. Paige loves when people sing happy birthday to her!.

Then it was time for the pinata. Alyssa busted the thing open pretty quickly, so I am glad the little kids had a chance before she did. It was full of candy and the kids filled their bags. Paige started opening lollipops and trying to eat them before she thought we would see her. That girl loves candy which is why we don't let her have very much.

Then it was time to open presents! She opened a lot of cool stuff- including two beautiful dresses. One from our friends Denise & Mike and the other from my mom. She truly is a blessed child.

The day was a success. Unfortunately the rest of the afternoon was not as fun as we had hoped. My nephew ended up getting hurt pretty badly, had to go to the ER, then had emergency surgery on his thumb (put a pin in it). They did not release him until the next afternoon. His younger brothers were pretty scared, but he is healing. He should be back to work shortly. It is a long story, but we are just happy it wasn't worse.