Our family of four wins the award for best hibernators.  We are bears.  Except for Bella who is more of a monkey.  The holiday took far to long to arrive and then BOOM.  done.  It was perfect.  And I say this from the perspective of being a very new convert to caring about the holiday.  It just hasn't ever been something high on my list of things to get excited about (I can take mellow to the extreme).  But, wow.  I relished creating Christmas for our love bug.  And the day was slow, and lazy, and pressure-free, and happy.  Much like our past few weeks have been.  Bill and I have both been on our death beds at various points due to some crazy lung crunchies--which means that energy has been hard to come by.  And while I hate the sick part--I adore that it does the impossible feat of slowing him down.  He sits.  He rests.  The only time he does this is when he is ill which is why I'm pretty sure he schedules himself to fall ill every Christmas Eve.  Every single one since I've known him. Watching our family "become family"  like, hmmmm....like, something about going through a holiday--just us--watching how we "do" Christmas unfold and be so "us"--it made getting to sit in the momma chair all the more sweet.

The most precious part was Asher's innocence to the day.  While we have been reading books and talking about Christmas it's all a pretty abstract concept for a not yet two-year-old to grasp.  One of my favorite moments from the day was first thing Christmas morning--Asher came downstairs and was more interested in the fire on tv than he was the presents under the tree.  Probably the last year that the day will be met w/o expectation from him; I cherish it.