New Family Traditions

It was a fun Christmas, filled with holiday cheer. We had Christmas Eve dinner with our friends, the McCombs. No pictures. But imagine 6 children ages 6 and under putting on the Nativity, and you'll know what a wild time it was. Anya, the mom, is Danish, so she made some traditional Danish Christmas dishes. Yummers.

Christmas morning, I awoke with end-of-pregnancy insomnia at 4:30 am. Joe followed, waking up at 5:15. We started our day watching "A Christmas Story" while our kids slept. It was kind of like a date, a very early one. Our kids were surprised at 7 when we were actually awake before them.
I think this is the first year that my kids really got into Santa Claus. It's because I've been indoctrinating them with various Christmas movies, since I've been doing a lot of movie watching in my end-of-pregnancy woeful state. The kids got pillow pets from Santa, which, as you can see from the above picture, were greeted with enthusiasm and immediate adoration.

Other present hits: an 8 doll Disney Princess collection, and a puzzle. Elliot's obsession with puzzles is amazing. I think if all I got him for his birthday were 3 puzzles, he would be ecstatic. He basically did the same puzzle over and over again yesterday.

Dottie put on a fashion show for me yesterday. She dressed up in her Disney princess dresses, got her dolls, and I took their twinner pictures. There were more than this. Also, she received princess shoes for Christmas that match some of the dresses, as you see in the Cinderella picture.

A funny Christmas story that almost became a sad Christmas story. Joe and I were getting ready to make fondue (two pictures below), not paying attention to our children. Elliot runs over, "Mom, my nose hurts." I tell him to get a tissue, knowing he has a runny nose. I wipe his nose, he keeps on fussing. I go about my business, ignoring my son. So, he approaches his father, "Dad my nose is hurting!" Joe looks up his nose, and what does he see? One of these beads, a red one:
It was wedged so far back in his nostril, we couldn't even tell it was one of these beads. I still don't know where it came from, because I'm not a bead crafter. Nonetheless, there it was, stuck far up our son's nose. He wouldn't blow his nose. He insisted over and over, "Take me to the doctor!" I get panicky, call my mom, knowing she's had kids stick things up their noses before. She laughs and laughs, the only advice she gives is to have him blow his nose. Thanks Mom . . . we've already failed at that multiple times. My dad calls me, saying to try a band-aid, on the outside of his nose, thinking it will have the effect of a Breathe Right strip, opening the sinuses. Doesn't work. Now I'm really thinking we're going to have to take him to the ER, on Christmas Day. Nightmare of nightmares on Lackland AFB, so I've heard. We could be waiting for 5 hours.

My dad calls again. Being the spiritual man that he is, he decided to pray about how to get the bead out. Why that didn't dawn on me and Joe, I don't know. But he received the inspiration that we should try mouth to mouth on him, plugging the other nostril with our finger. So I hold his nose, Joe does the mouth to mouth, and after 4 or 5 attempts, out shoots the bead.

This is almost as good as the Dottie dime story, is it not? At least it came out, and we saw it, unlike the dime.

Here we are, enjoying our Christmas fondue, after the crisis was averted. Last night we had cheese fondue, today we had chocolate fondue. I say this is definitely a keeper for Hansen family Christmas traditions.

The above picture looks like Halloween, right? No, this was this morning. Dottie had a tea party with her Disney princesses. Elliot wanted to join, so he dressed up like a tiger. Why not? Tigers and princesses, they go together so well.

Hope you had as fun and exciting of a Christmas as we did! Minus the bead incident, of course.