Pre-Christmas Christmas

About a week before Christmas, we learned that Brad's parents - commonly referred to in both the P house and our house as Nana and PopPop - were coming down to the Cities on Friday to spend the holidays with their [actual] kids. Since we weren't leaving until Saturday and we are their adopted children (especially Mike, who spent as much time at their house as his own growing up), we "casually" asked where they were staying so we could "casually" drop by to wish them a Merry Christmas and get some hugs.

Brad's sister doubted our "casual" ability and decided to throw a "pre-Pilcher Christmas" pizza party on Friday night - and just save time by inviting us (she's so smart!). We are so grateful that both B and C include us in their family events. We happily claim Vannestes, Johnsons, Collers, and Pilchers!

The girls were off school on Friday, and I worked from home. My office closed early, so the girls and I also used the time to get us packed up for the trip North the next day. I gave them a list in the morning of things they needed to accomplish. They weren't too happy about it until they read the line "if you can agree on a place, I'll take you out to lunch." Spoiler alert: they agreed - and we had a delightful girls lunch out at Perkins. They were so well-behaved and happily smiled and said "Merry Christmas" to other diners. When I went to pay, we found that a gentleman had left $5 to help cover our bill. So kind and made their day. 

I picked Dec up a little early and got everyone run through the shower before we headed over to Terra's house for pizza. The kids had a blast playing with their buddies and we had the best time visiting with the full P family. I had tried to explain to the girls how we were "adopted Pilchers," which somehow ended with them thinking that Brad was adopted. They eventually decided an explanation was unnecessary as long as our status continues to mean that we get Nana's fresh-baked banana bread. 

We slept in a bit Saturday morning, finished packing up (while Mike muttered a lot about how much stuff we were bringing), and hit the road late morning. Everyone was in a holly jolly mood and we got about an hour of driving in before we decided to stop at Denny's for lunch. We often grab drive thru food to keep moving when we go up, so a full stop at a sit-down restaurant was a big treat. We enjoyed the extra time out of the car, filled our bellies, got Newsies rolling in the DVD player, and pointed the car north. 

The drive was uneventful (hallelujah!), we arrived at Gma and Gpa's mid-afternoon, and ... best of all ... there was SNOW in Rapids! Christmas could officially begin.

Eventful Birthday

Sigh ... that thing we learned when I had to do thirteen blog posts in September to catch up ... it didn't stick. Or - this is a strategic move to keep my memory sharp. Maybe it's that ...

If we rewind waaaaaaaaayyyy back to Mike's birthday (five days before Christmas for those of you who are already fully locked in 2019), a few notable events occurred - perhaps even more notable than it being Mike's last birthday in his thirties!

On my drive to work, my radio station reminded me that tickets for the second Garth Brooks concert went on sale that morning. Garth is basically bucket list for me - to the point where Mike and I even considered flying out to Vegas when he was doing a residency there. My bucket list suffers from the fact that I am also pretty cheap - which meant I was never ready to pay all the money for a trip to Vegas. But the tickets for the concert here were reasonably priced, as long as you could buy them through Ticketmaster and not be subjected to the markups of people reselling them.

Promptly at 10am, I logged into Ticketmaster - to find myself in a queue behind 2000+ people (which was WAY more than that ... it was just as high as it would count). I waited in queue for almost two hours (which sounds more impressive than it was. It was online so I just had the Ticketmaster window open on one of my monitors while I went about my day on the other one. And stressed, of course) and against ALL ODDS, I got tickets!!! They aren't great seats, but they aren't horrible either. After my adrenaline rush wore off, I sent Mike a text to tell him I had bought him the birthday present of being able to take me to the concert. All people should be so lucky to have wives as generous as I am.

Then at the very end of the afternoon, I got a call with an offer for a new job. It's a different role within the same company. I applied for it in early October and have been through four rounds of interviews. I was not expecting to hear anything before the holidays, so was caught a bit by surprise. When I told Mike, he reminded me that he accepted the job for the theater last year on his birthday. I told him maybe next year, we celebrate his day without major life changes.

That was a lot of emotion packed into a work day and I was exhausted. But we still managed to celebrate our favorite family leader with Swedish meatballs and ice cream in a cup (with a candle because we're classy). It may have been a subdued end of Mike's thirties, but if the kids and I have anything to do with it, the forties will not come quietly.

Last Days of School

The girls had a busy last two days of school before winter break. On Wednesday, Fiona's class had their music performance where they did The Nutcracker - complete with music, dancing, and words. Quinn asked if she could come again. I told her to work it out with her teacher. When Mike and I got there, he asked if we should save Q a seat. I told him it would be foolish if we didn't. To the surprise of no one, a short blonde head appeared exactly on time to be her sister's biggest fan.

Fiona has been very nervous for her performance because she had a speaking part. A rather large one, in fact. She's been practicing at home and we've been working on enunciating and speaking slowly. She didn't always like my coaching - but she clearly paid attention to it. She nailed her part and looked so confident. With full acknowledgement of our bias, we think she was one of the best speakers. She spoke clearly and loudly and was easy to understand.

The program was very cute and her class did a great job. It's really been fun seeing her embrace classical music as it's put in a context that she can get excited about. Her enthusiasm has been contagious for her siblings and "Classical Christmas" was a highly requested Pandora station this season.

Thursday was the last day of school for the year and Quinn could hardly wait ... it was gingerbread house day in First Grade. Each student was responsible for bringing something to contribute for decorating options. We were assigned gumdrops. She also brought a box of small candy canes because we had leftovers and her teacher said it would help. What made me giggle the most was how she carefully planned her strategy for over a week. She asked each of her friends what they were bringing and then determined what she would use and how many she would need. Q loves it when a good plan comes together!

She insisted I photograph the finished house the very.second we walked in the door from school - so I'm assuming that it lived up to expectations. Between fun final days and a long break, they are not going to be thrilled about getting back in the swing of things next week.

Christmas Magic

We are in the sweetest spot of Christmas magic this year. Our stair-step approach to three children is really paying off as 8, 6, and 4 is simply golden. Tonight, they made our favorite rolo pretzel cookies with very little assistance from me (I did the oven part). Their gingerbread house skills are top notch. They are all equally competent in finding our elf - and his hiding places can be a bit more challenging. And they can even play Christmas songs whenever they want thanks to D's solid Google skills.

We are also expanding our holiday movie repertoire. Mike thought they might be ready for Home Alone, but after we explained the premise to Bugs, she claims they are not (I had also voted no). We did watch Elf and have big plans to watch The Santa Clause too. While not yet appropriate in full, we've shown them a few clips from National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation and Mike cannot wait until he can show them the whole thing. [Don't worry - he and I watched it after the troops went to bed. We've also decided Die Hard may be a few years out. But it will happen!]

It's so fun to hear them discuss their favorite traditions and which things they don't want to miss. I sometimes feel guilty that they don't wake up at their own house on Christmas morning. They know that if they really wanted to stay home, we would. However, so many of the favorite traditions happen up north. In fact, Quinn told me today that her favorite part of the holidays is being with her cousins. And cooking with Grandma. Also high on the combined favorites list: Winter Wonderland, decorating cookies at Grandma's, moonlight walk in the woods, and visiting Santa.

Speaking of Santa, I'm fearful that we are in our final year of three believers. Bugs is asking a lot of really insightful questions about this whole Santa thing. I'm doing my best to answer her very honestly while not ruining it for her siblings - who are almost always there when she asks. She wants to believe, but is trying to fit the pieces of this puzzle together. While I know that Christmas will continue to be great as they get older, I'm consciously enjoying the magic this year ... just in case.

I also may always insist on matching pajamas. I'm going to ride that train as long as they will humor me - or I can guilt them into it!

Surviving the Weekend

As we neared last weekend, I felt an overwhelming sense of foreboding. I couldn't quite figure out why I was so stressed out and tried to chalk it up to some things going on at work and general holiday stuff. By the end of the weekend, I remembered. This is the weekend that knocks us off our feet - every single year. We've had pneumonia, triple ear infections, various colds, a broken washing machine, and [shudder] the lice. No wonder I seem to have a bit of post-traumatic stress going into this stretch.

If you got our annual Christmas letter, you may have read a note about an alleged not broken foot. Mike is currently at urgent care getting x-rays because two weeks later, the "not broken" foot is still extremely painful. He also went down with a stomach bug over the weekend. So I'd say the streak continues. [Update: not broken. deep bone bruise]

What I find most remarkable every year is that even as the weekend tries to take us down with it, we get through and still often manage some holiday fun. This year was no exception. We watched Elf for the first time as a family, and it was so fun to see the kids experience it. Fiona belly-laughed through the whole thing! That kid loves slapstick comedy!! They have been discussing their favorite parts for the last couple days and Quinn even pulled out a "Son of a Nutcracker" today at pick up.

Before the stomach bug took Mike out, we also made it to Winter Wonderland to look at the lights. This is a favorite tradition and it never disappoints. It was a mild night, so was very crowded. Instead of having our hot chocolate and cookies in the busy garage, we sat out by the bonfire and had a lovely time. Dec even saw a couple of his friends from school, which made him super proud.

The kids had the best time building their gingerbread house - and their skills are improving year over year. It's a good looking house ... and has about five pounds of candy on it! I also got all the presents wrapped and my three little elves were actually very helpful and didn't peek. Not even once.

On Sunday, I sang with the holiday choir at church. Our church's congregation is on the older side ... which was never so clear as when I ended up as the third member of the "children's choir" for one of the songs. As the third youngest member of the choir, the two teenagers and I were "the kids." It was fun to sing in a church choir again and a three-week practice schedule was just the right level of commitment. They've already started recruiting me for the Easter service choir.

While the streak continued, moments of fun peppered their way into the weekend. And those are what we will remember ... although I clearly also remembered the stress. But mostly the fun. Mostly.