We traded silent nights for kids.

* I have to acknowledge that there are so many things I haven't blogged about yet, but need to start somewhere so I plan to work backwards. We'll see how it goes.*

Today is the first Christmas Eve we will spend as our own little family with a little who understands and appreciates all things Christmas. We usually go to Brandon's parents' house, but things didn't work this year. We visit my family in the summer instead of Christmas for reasons like the recent ice storm my family experience in Ontario, leaving them without power for hours (and they were the lucky ones that got the power back on). Here's the view from my parents' driveway:

We celebrated on our own in 2011, but as Teagan was just a year old, we didn't do much in the way of frills or traditions. So we wanted to deliver this year. We began with a candlelit dinner of various appetizers like egg rolls, mozzarella sticks and chicken bites. It consisted mostly of Teagan nibbling the breading off the cheese sticks, interspersed with us pleading with her to sit down (my first use of the age old "there's still time for me to call Santa and tell him not to bring gifts") and her trying to blow out the candles like it was her birthday. Not ideal, though it made a nice segue for us to talk about the fact that we celebrate Jesus' birthday at Christmastime. I found a beautiful video the church produced about keeping Christ in Christmas. We had the missionaries over for dinner and they challenged us to share something about Christ via social media, so I shared this one. My favourite quote: "We put Christ in Christmas when we give the gifts He wants us to give: the gift of ourselves." We had the missionaries over for dinner and they challenged us to share something about Christ via social media, so I shared THIS one. Beautiful.

We decided to take it to heart and write down gifts that we would give to Jesus, meaning things we would do to improve ourselves and/or help others. 

Daddy: Daddy is going to be less critical and look for the good in others.
Mummy: Mummy is going to be more patient and scream less.
Teagan: Teagan is going to listen to her Mummy and Daddy and teachers.
Mason: Mason is going to throw up less. (For the record, he's already blown it.)

We put them in a basket and set them under the tree. Sidenote: I would have loved to include more pictures, but the fact is, Teagan was only wearing "everywhere" and socks for 95% of our Christmas Eve festivities. This girl.

 

At this point, Teagan was bouncing off the walls, so we let off a little steam dancing to 'Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree' which was perfect. From there, we sat down at the piano and sang 'Jinger Bell Rock', Teagan belting out those three "words" over and over, regardless of what the words actually were. We ended with Away in a Manger, with Teagan desperately trying to watch our mouths in order to sing along. Her singing was so earnest that it melted my heart.

Since there are just four of us, we opted to play out The Nativity with our Little People Nativity instead of dressing the part. Brandon read the story from the scriptures and Teagan and I moved the people to recreate the night of Baby Jesus' birth. It went much better than anticipated - although I was sure to keep my expectations low. To drive the story home, we cuddled and watched The Nativity. We had awesome lessons in church on Sunday that encouraged us to ensure that Christ is the focal point of our Christmas celebrations. Watching videos has helped me visualize the stories and make me feel as though I'm there and I hoped that watching the videos would do the same for Teagan.

Another first: We had Teagan pick out some cookies for Santa. In a last ditch effort to score bonus points with the man in read, Teagan argued for five cookies, but we settled on three.

 

We spent quality time as a little family, we had fun, we felt the Spirit and remembered our Saviour Jesus Christ. And then we tried to put Teagan to bed, really putting my gift to Jesus (if you'll remember, I'm supposed to scream less) to the test. She woke up numerous times in tears because we "just left!" We snuggle with her when she goes to bed and have been staying until she falls asleep, but lately she has been waking up and getting upset that we aren't there. Since it's Christmas, we cracked and allowed her to sleep in our bed. She was a little too excited at the prospect and didn't actually fall asleep for quite some time. Grr. At least it made for a cute photo opportunity.

Before she joined us, I did manage to snap photos of both Teagan and Mason sleeping soundly (something I hope to make a Christmas Eve tradition), presumably with visions of sugarplums dancing in their heads. In reality, it was most likely visions of sleeping horizontally, kicking Daddy in the head repeatedly and projectile vomiting of warm milk all over Mummy, respectively. Merry Christmas indeed.