This morning Gracen awoke at her usual time of 6:30 a.m. and was thrilled when we gave her her stocking filled with little treasures to root through…
She’s been patiently eyeing up the pretty packages scattered along the living room floor for days now while we’ve been reminding her that they are “for looking, but not for touching”. Today was finally her lucky day and she took unwrapping her packages very seriously.
She carefully opened each little stocking gift, ripping off tiny bits of paper until each present was fully revealed.
After all of that hard work, she finally got to enjoy her gifts. True to our tradition, this year she got Christmas jammies (which she opened on Christmas Eve and wore to bed), a special Christmas book, a new ornament for the tree, a few stocking stuffers, and one bigger item – her vintage table and chair set. She’ll also be getting a few handmade gifts at our ‘Christmas in January’ in the Okanagan, but shhhh… She doesn’t know that yet.
Grandpa Dave, Grandma Charlotte, and Uncle Brett arrived to our place shortly afterwards and once everyone had a cup of coffee in hand, Gracen opened her packages from her grandparents and uncle.
Talk about being spoiled. She got some new clothes, shoes, winter gear, hair pretties, books, and blocks.
Of course she loved Papa’s Steve Jobs biography just as much as her own gifts. :)
After present opening, it was time for stories with Uncle Brett while Mama, Papa, and GC prepared brunch.
Christmas breakfast, complete with a tree-shaped egg and a brand new Christmas dish set from Great Grandma Shirley.
With a messy breakfast out of the way, Grae got dressed in her pretty little Christmas clothes and shoes.
The rest of our day pretty much looked like this. There was a lot of lounging, reading, snacking, and relaxing involved.
Of course there was also lots of playing with her new things for Miss G. She absolutely adores these photo blocks from GC and GD.
Back to eating! Last year, Grae wasn’t yet eating solids, so this was her first ever Christmas dinner. She even tried a few of the Ukranian foods Mama’s family always had at holiday meals while growing up and liked them all.
Our hope was to take a decent family photo dinner was cleaned up and put away, but unfortunately, that mission proved to be impossible. Five grown adults and a baby in one shot led to silly faces, hysterical laughing, crossed eyes, and a random Cabbage Patch doll joining the family. But you know what wasn’t impossible? Getting 15 great shots of a too-busy-to-sit-still-for-one-minute toddler. Haha! Weird how that works. Ogasawara crew, you’re a tough bunch!
Our night ended with a light tour walk around the neighbourhood, an overly excited little lady being tucked into bed, and a few generously-poured rum and eggnogs. All in all, it was a lovely first Christmas back in Canada and I can’t wait until we get to do it all again in the Okanagan with the other side of our family.
pls give me tutorials on “how to be a good mom” and on creativity…. ur the best jen!!
Aw, Anny, you’re too sweet. You’ll be a fantastic mom! For the creativity part, you should join Pinterest… So many great ideas for kids and babies on there!