Winter Break

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Six days into the new year and we are almost back to normal life again.

I enjoyed our Christmas Day. It was quietly spent at home. We woke up and opened gifts, had cinnamon rolls for breakfast, played with new gifts and enjoyed a delicious dinner at home. We appreciate the gifts that we received from distant family members, including a tiny wooden bird perch, which was crafted by Steven's Grandpa Donald, who passed away in November, but left Christmas gifts packaged and ready to mail.

Steven's mom gave us a new DVD/Blue Ray player for Christmas (the old DVD player we had was possessed and would turn itself off randomly in the middle of movies), but we weren't able to hook it up because our TV set was too old to have the right connections. So, the Saturday after Christmas we did some research and took advantage of the gift card from Steven's Dad, and some other resources we received, to order a brand new flat screen TV.  
On New Years' Eve we stayed home watching movies, playing games, and eating snacks. The next day we took down the Christmas decorations and cleaned house. We also bought some curtains and a lamp, and rearranged the furniture in our living room, so the whole room has a different feel to it.

The TV arrived January 2nd. It is slightly too wide to fit comfortably in the cubby of our TV stand, so Steven is contemplating taking the TV stand apart and rebuilding it into something else. The kids have really enjoyed watching movies on the new TV with the new DVD player.

The rest of our holiday break has been spent reading, watching movies and playing with LEGOs. John and Josh have spent time working on programming. Hannah has created movies (using her brothers for actors and voices) and posted them on YouTube under the name Lala Isfluffy.

Last night, as we were getting dinner on the table, I mentioned a game I'd played in the past, and all the kids expressed a desire to play. So, after dinner the family gathered around the table to play Fictionary.  (It's like Balderdash, but doesn't have a game board.) We borrowed the little dry erase boards from Wits and Wagers (which is remarkably similar, only using numbers instead of words) to write on, and had a lot of fun with it.

School starts again tomorrow. The winter break has been fun, but I'm looking forward to returning to normal routines and schedules.

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