Christmas Ornaments

Heather caught some sort of nasty 24 hour stomach bug that really knocked her down Sunday. While that’s no fun, it’s not really a newsworthy event when you are interacting with toddlers on a daily basis.

What was newsworthy, or at least qualifies as “something I hope to remember” was how Hannah responded.

Once she realized mommy wasn’t feeling good, Hannah would not leave her side. Heather curled up on the couch to watch a Christmas movie, and Hannah crawled up into the blankets with her, and quietly watched an entire move next to mom! I don’t know if I can properly express how unusual that is. Normally if the TV is showing *anything* that isn’t Elmo (including non Elmo-centric content on the Elmo show) Hannah will reliably throw a fit. She also appeared to be unable to sit still on the couch with us for more than two minutes; judging from prior experience.

It was a very Sweet scene in our house, that I would have loved to take pictures of, but given that this all started when Heather started feeling awful, I don’t imagine it would be popular had I taken a picture of the two of them and posted it online. Just imagine those two cuddled up on the couch under a blanket 🙂

When not nursing her mommy back to health, Hannah commandeered an old purse as hers. You might wonder what an almost two-year-old would keep in a purse? Every Christmas tree ornament she can reach of course! She hasn’t protested much when we re-decorate the tree, but she also hasn’t been afraid to restock her purse when we aren’t looking. Every day brings new stuff I guess.

-Jordan

Heather and I have a (short) tradition of getting a new ornament every year. Herbie got the honors this year… Heather sometimes talks like I am the only one who feels weird about being in Iowa, but I think we both have strong allegiances there. We have the same little tree from last year, it works really well in our space-limited apartment. We still don’t have many Christmas decorations, but the tree does a lot to make the apartment feel the holiday spirit.

Speaking of the holiday spirit, Heather and I have discovered that we listened to different Christmas music while doing traditional things like decorating the tree…. and I find that I don’t feel as into it without that. Heather’s tradition is to watch “White Christmas” during/after the tree decorating. I know my family always listened to the same albums of Christmas music… I just don’t know what those albums were called. Heather has actually accused me of being “a scrooge” but I just don’t care for some of the more…. artistic interpretations of traditional Christmas songs.

Along with tree decorating, Heather spearheaded baking some Christmas treats. More than spearheaded, I didn’t even help. Not to say I wasn’t willing, but we have found that only one person should work in our galley kitchen at a time. It only takes a few times bumping into the other person when you are trying to quick get something done to think it isn’t fun anymore. After making some amazing cookies, Heather broke them up into a bunch of gift plates:

We then worked our way around the building giving them away to any of our neighbors who happened to be home. It was a fun thing to do, and I am really glad she took the initiative to do it. I think about half our neighbors weren’t sure what to think, but it’s hard to complain about a plate of cookies!

I know this is a few days early, but we are looking to slip out of Des Moines before another wave of ice and snow shuts the city down, so I probably won’t get the chance to post closer to the actual day…. Merry Christmas!!!

-Jordan

p.s. I don’t think I ever mentioned before, the ornament from last year was a sand timer… we only had a month until the wedding at Christmas 🙂