Christmas. Oh Drama Mama!!!

We had a wonderful Christmas this year in our home.  I was so nice to stay in our jammies all day long and just enjoy each other.  Tim cooked a nice breakfast for the family and I cooked a Thanksgiving dinner for our family since Tim & I missed out on a full Thanksgiving meal due to traveling back from Ukraine.  I’m not sure why, but I was really craving some butternut squash and turkey with gravy.  YUM!





She was surprised she got an American Girl doll!



 

The kids enjoyed all their gifts they received.  They played all day together without fighting.  Katie received mainly crafts much to her joy.  The younger two girls’ favorite gifts were their American Girl dolls.  It was fun to see the girls playing with their dolls for several hours.  So many times kids their ages are not playing with toys, but rather they are watching television or have their face in an ipod or ipad.  In the evening we went over and had desserts and gifts with my parents.  It was so nice not to be traveling and to just relax together.

The day after Christmas we had a little bit of drama.  I had just finished working out and was taking a shower when I heard a knock on the bathroom door.  Why does someone always have to knock when I’m in the shower?  Young moms, It seriously never ends.  When they were babies, I’d bring their carrier in with me to keep an eye on them while I showered and they’d start crying as soon as my hair was all lathered up and itchy.  As toddlers, I got tiny fingers and toes showing under the door from outside the door.  Now I get knock, knock, knock “Mooooom????” (Love, love all of my babies so much...but I do not love the knocking when I'm in the shower).

This particular knock was “Mommmm” in a crying, squeaking voice.  Haley and Kylie had gone down to the 11-year-old neighbor girls’ house to “play American Girl dolls” as they call it.  Haley walked all the way home crying, with her new American Girl doll’s HEAD in one hand, and the body in her other hand.  She was devastated!  Apparently she thought the string on the back of the doll’s neck was packaging material so she cut it with scissors.  This made the head detach from the body.  It made sense that she would think that it was packaging material because the strings to the boots of her doll also need to be cut in order to change into a new set of shoes.

She cried and cried about waiting her “whole life” for an American Girl doll and how she “killed her in only one day.”  She “really, really loved her and didn’t mean to kill her.”  I’d heard there was a hospital for these dolls.  So I googled it and got on the phone.  Haley was still wailing and crying about how sorry she was that she “chopped her head off” and “didn’t mean to kill her.”  The lady on the other end was walking me through all of our options.  Haley continued on and on in the background.  The lady asked, “How old is your daughter?”  I told her “She’s 8 years old and this is her very first American Girl doll.”  Then Haley whimpered with tears still rolling down her cheeks and sniffling snot, “I got 45 dollars for Christmas and she can have it ALL if she will just sew this head back on my doll.” “Where should I lay her dead body, Mama? I just loved her so much.”  The lady heard what Haley was saying and she said, “I’ll tell you what.  I don’t want Haley’s first experience with American Girl dolls to be a traumatic one.  I’m just going to send her a new doll for free.  Which doll does she want?”  So she allowed Haley to flip through the magazine and choose a new doll.  Whenever the new doll comes, we just send the “dead one” back.   Holy Drama, Mama!!! Girls!  Haley was so relieved when I hung up the phone, she wrote the nice lady a thank you note.  It was really hard not to laugh my head off (no pun intended) because her note was so darn funny! “Dear American Girl lady Thank you for sending me a doll with a head still attached.  I bet girls really like you. Love Haley”

 

I started homeschooling last week.  It is going SO well.  We hopped in our Honda Pilot this past Sunday and the gas tank was still on FULL a whole week later.  Typically we have to fill up every single week.  With us not driving to and from the Academy every day, we saved a lot of money.  We have the kids spread all throughout the house.  Katie is on Tim’s computer.  Kylie is up in the loft on the resurrected laptop I used back in college.  Haley is in our master bedroom on my laptop.   

One wonderful thing about homeschooling is there is time for A LOT of one-on-one time. 

Though we have had a little bit of drama in this household over a broken, “dead” doll, over all homeschooling is a welcomed change and we have had a great week at home!  We have so much to be thankful for and I feel so very blessed by God.