Christmas

Well, I think the last post I put about Christmas was behind. I took some pictures to show that we were slowly catching up. (but I never blogged about it...slacker! :)) We got our tree up and wrapped some presents.

We made it through the last few days of work (we didn't get off until Dec. 21st). A sigh of relief....until about 1:00a.m. when Olivia started to throw up. She was up the remainder of the night throwing up. The next day I had many errands to run and things to get done before Christmas, so John stayed home to take care of Olivia. She wasn't sick anymore, but very weak and very tired.

We continued to get ready for Christmas over the next few days, but also tried to take it easy for Olivia's sake. We made some crafts and stayed home and played. I sewed every chance I got to be sure to get everyone's orders done before Christmas.

Christmas Eve mid day we went to Johns' dad's house. We enjoyed a great brunch and family time.

It was getting to be naptime, so we headed home. I was exhausted since I have been staying up most nights until 2 (at the earliest) to work on sewing, so I laid down to take a nap. I woke up and noticed that John was under a blanket and really cold. This is not like him. About 5:30 on Christmas Eve John got sick. He felt miserable. He insisted that I take her on to my family's house for our Christmas Eve celebrations, so with my stomach feeling off, we loaded up and headed to mom's. I didn't have time to be sick! There was still a ton to be done, so I figured I felt nauseaus since I had been surrounded by it since early morning Thursday. We ate a great dinner, opened our Christmas Eve presents (always pj's and a nutcracker) and then made our traditional sugar cookies.

Oscar loves to help bake!

It was super late and we knew Santa would be coming soon, so Olivia and I went back home. Poor John was sound asleep on the couch, so I quietly took Olivia to bed. Once she finally went to sleep, it was time to get busy. I still had gifts to wrap, crafts to finish (the footprints above), and sewing to complete. At 4:40 I finally laid down. This is our first Christmas to not spend the night at mom and dad's, but it wasn't really optional. So, I guess it worked out. We got up and Olivia opened her presents from Santa here at home.

She stopped mid way to clean up and then said, "wipe" and took off downstairs for a kleenex. It was pretty comical to watch her. I think she was most excited about the batteries.

A few nights ago when I was rocking her she said, "baba's (batteries), Santa, ho ho ho!" I thought that was super cute! She finally understood that Santa wasn't some guy who comes in the house in the middle of the night to do anything bad. When we first mentioned him and told her he was going to bring her toys she said, "noooooo" and looked very frightened. We have a stuffed Santa that when she saw it she said, "back" as in to put it back in the attic. She loves him now and he stays in her room.
So, we finished up at home and got ready to go to mom's. We had a lot of fun opening presents there and then ate a delicious lunch.

Luckily, John felt well enough to go. I knew he was still weak, but he wasn't missing Olivia's first Christmas home. Before we knew it, it was time for mom and dad to head out to Chattanooga. We hung out a bit more while John and Olivia napped. This gave me a great opportunity to play with Annelyn. They woke up and it was time to go to his mom's house. She had a huge meal! We opened presents and then John and I played catch phrase with his neices.

In the meantime, Olivia had gotten her appetite back so she was getting Nana and Aunt Amy to feed her as much as they would. It was late and Olivia needed to get to bed. We came home, changed clothes and then went back to mom and dad's house to keep their dogs since they were in Chattanooga. Somewhere in all of this, I began to feel miserable. By this morning, I had zero voice and had been up with nausea all night. I never did get sick though. I went to the doctor only to learn that I must have the same virus, but that it hit me differently. I feel flu-like whereas they threw up. I also have an upper respitory virus. So, instead of cleaning, shopping and playing with Olivia today, I have spent my day in the bed. All this to say, this really isn't how we invisioned our first Christmas with Olivia. However, I told John I would much rather her be here with us all sick then her be in Korea and us here without her. We love that child so much!!! She is so much fun. I am hoping I feel better tomorrow and that we can play. At some point, I really need to find my floor. As John tripped over toys a few minutes ago, he said, "um...we may need to pick up a bit." They played all day and all the new toys haven't found new homes yet. That is on the list this week. Merry Christmas! We are so blessed to have this Christmas with our precious Olivia!