Merry and Bright

We had a lovely Christmas.

Alyssa got the phone she’s wanted for, well, forever. I was lucky enough to get to send her the first text.

Olivia got her Bitty Baby from American Girl and a tablet from her Gram that has a keyboard and so she calls her laptop. Yes, she calls it that to rub it in to her sister that her tablet is that awesome.

We spent hours and hours at my mom’s house on Christmas day. The girls played with cousins, Tom talked to my brothers and step-dad and I settled on my mom’s couch under a blanket so I could cough the afternoon away while watching a Tiny House Hunters marathon.

We had a great visit with Tom’s sons and their families. We all marveled several times about how great the grandkids were, all six of them. They’re eight, six, five, three, three and one and they were all amazingly well-behaved.

The one-year old, Eliza, fussed each time she saw her dad but Tom isn’t intimidated by a crying baby. I mean, come on, he survived Olivia’s infancy, so a fussy baby doesn’t affect him at all, he’d just carry E out of sight of her dad and all would be well.

For a self-proclaimed Scrooge, Tom was very merry this holiday. He tries every year to bah-humbug his way through Christmas but each year the fun of watching kids open presents, of seeing their joy gets to him. I love that about him.

It didn’t even matter that the heating element went out in our oven on Christmas Eve. My mom took the pie I’d planned to bake home with her and baked it for me. I baked brownies at her house on Christmas day to take to Josh’s house the next day and we just rolled with it.

Tom ordered the part for the oven and it should be here on Wednesday. All is well and merry and bright in our little corner of the world.