For New Years Eve we thought about going downtown to look at lights and ice skate at River Front Park, but its too cold! It's been 27-34 degrees F every day. So, instead we enjoyed an evening in watching the Star Wars Mandelorian. We finished season 2.
We received more snow. The boys had fun playing in it. This is the first year that Kaiden has been able to build most or at least a good portion of his Lego sets on his own. Every once in a while he has to ask his big brother (the Lego master) for help. For Christmas every year I ask the boys to draw me a family picture. Kaiden finally drew me a picture. He said the one on the left with all the dots is Connor. The dots are his zits. Poor Connor.. the teenage years are rough. I love the deer in our neighborhood. I'll miss them when we move. They use the cross walks and wonder around town. My parents were sad they didn't have many pictures at their new house in Arizona. So, in addition to the large group of pictures I already sent... I made them a fold out coffee table book with pictures of them and the boys. I'm also sending my dad one of the metal puzzles that Jason and I have had so much fun solving.
Connor left a note for Santa. He didn't tell us he was going to write Santa a note and just quietly left the note next to Santa's cookies. After reading his responses the boys checked out their gift from Santa and opened their stockings. Santa gave Kaiden a Lego set and Connor a switch game. Connor's favorite stocking gift was some chocolate straws, Harry Potter ornaments and mechanical pencils. Kaiden's favorite was mechanical pencils, electric tooth brush, and bath bombs. I got Jason some ornaments too and a metal puzzle. It's 2 twisted metal pieces that you have to figure out how to unhook them and take them apart and then put them back together again. He spent quiet a bit of time playing with it, but eventually figured it out. I had fun figuring it out as well, so a few days later I went back to the store and bought a few more metal puzzles. I made a big dinner for Christmas, even though it was just the 4 of us again. Connor requested the green bean casserole again, which everyone loves. I made my mom's pea salad, which we love. Jason requested the crab salad again. I made a turkey again since we're not big ham fans. Plus my work gave me a gift card for a free turkey for Christmas. The boys spent the day playing table tennis, building Lego's and playing Nintendo Switch games.
Christmas Eve at our house consisted mainly of the boys silently putting together their Lego creations and Jason doing his stocks. He recently took an interest in learning how to trade stocks. He's invested $5K into penny stocks and plays around with trading. I spent the day mainly cooking and making salads for our Christmas dinner.
I think Jason and I were more excited for the boys to open their gifts than they were. They weren't even asking or touching the presents, but we decided to let them open all their gifts today... on Pre-Christmas eve. That way they get more time to play with everything on their break from school. Plus we feel bad they really haven't been able to play with other kids due to covid. Kaiden's big gift was his 4-wheeler, which he got before Christmas. But he also got a bunch of Lego's and some Star Wars lightsabers. Connor's big gift was his Nintendo Switch game system with 2 games. Plus he got a bunch of Lego's too, including a huge set with 1200 pieces. Jason also got them a VR headset which is pretty cool. Somehow Piper knew which gift was hers and tried to open it on her own. She never touched any other gifts... just her stuffed dinosaur toy gift. I also bought her a dog puzzle, which she gets too excited to play. Oh and Jason got a little too competitive playing table tennis and fell into our tree. He bent some of the branches, so we have a Jason size dent now. LOL
The boys and I made 4 different types of cookies- chocolate chip walnut, chocolate crackle, peanut butter blossom and sugar cookies. Plus chocolate fudge. We had fun making and decorating the sugar cookies. We also let the boys open a Christmas gift early- a table tennis set. Jason said he played table tennis at a friends house growing up and has fond memories of it. This was the first time the boys have played table tennis. Kaiden loves it! Jason and Kaiden are really into it. The little die hards could play everyday! Connor and I like it too, just not quiet as much. I surprised the boys and made some hot cocoa bombs too. I saw them on-line and they looked so fun. The boys enjoyed them. I took plates full of cookies and fudge over to 3 of our favorite neighbors, along with a Christmas card. Then we let the boys open another gift- they each got a Lego Star Wars.
