Buy One Get Two Free!: Christmas Magic

Life has definitely changed for us with Kindergarteners. Being at school 5 days a week for over 7 hours a day, our house feels like a ghost town during the week. The kids are EXHAUSTED when they get off the bus, sometimes I can barely even coral them into the house without meltdowns. I've literally resorted to having snacks in my hand in the driveway to help the transition, and many days I have dinner on the table at 3:55 because that seems to make the evening go better. The release when they get off that bus is unbelievable to watch. It's like they've been holding it together until the second their foot leaves the last step, then it's all over. Getting them into the house, shoes and jackets off, backpacks emptied, and washing hands is flat out torture. Their before school routine runs pretty smooth, but after school it's the same routine everyday and we are in January and I feel I have to repeat myself 300 times in the first 5 minutes they are off the bus. I've missed them so much and sometimes I'm yelling at them within a minute of being home.

So as part of my New Year's resolution I'm trying to find ways to avoid yelling at them. There are days I feel ALL I do is yell. The triplet dynamic is so chaotic. They completely feed off each other. Some days it is more than I can manage to keep my sanity. My best defense is divide and conquer because trying to rationalize and calm them down as a group is laughable at best. If for any reason one is not in the room, it's like a cake walk. Like not a little bit easier, but astronomically easier. I literally cannot wrap my head around how big of a difference it is. I can go to the grocery store with 1 or 2 of my cherubs and go completely unnoticed as they walk quietly beside the cart and I easily read my list and collect items. Add the third child and everyone in Shaw's knows all 3 of my children's first and middle names, is subjected to an exorbitant amount of disciplinary actions, and some occasional swear words and I literally haven't made it through the produce section yet. Lord have mercy.

This fall was busy with soccer, piano, and swimming. The kids are about to do the smurf basketball league for the next 6 weeks which will get them out and moving in the winter. This winter has not been too cold, so I try to get them outside to play as much as we can. Problem is, getting off the bus at 4 pm and it gets dark at 4:30 doesn't leave you a lot of time. Glad daylight minutes keep increasing every day now so they can get their daily dose of sibling time in outside. They are in that great creative play stage where they make up games to play. I love hearing them play 'construction' or 'ninja police' or Sammy's favorite 'rescue' where they make up a disaster and rescue it. Plus there is a lot less fighting over toys outside which is a huge plus.

Christmas was awesome this year. Kids are so into Santa and all the magic. Elsie and Sammy's classes at school had an Elf on the Shelf so I lucked out another year as I have been doing everything and anything not to do that elf. We went to Auntie Tracey's and Danny touched their elf and then had a complete meltdown that they wouldn't get a Santa visit. It took me a half dozen made up excuses to convince him otherwise. And convincing Danny is tough because he is not fooled easily. We saw Santa at the Home Depot when he visited the kids at a workshop, and then saw Santa again at a friend's house and Danny was quick to point out that they weren't the same Santa (different eye color and beard was curlier). Luckily for me Danny said 'Do you think Santa has his elves dress up because he's busy?' and I was like YES because if not he wouldn't have time to get all the presents together. Whew, another crisis averted.

We spent Christmas eve with Miguel's side of the family and came home and spread reindeer food on the lawn, and put out cookies and milk. Christmas morning, Sammy and Elsie slept till 7, came running in our room, and laid in bed with us for an hour until Danny woke up at 8am and we all came downstairs. So that in itself was a Christmas Miracle! Our Christmas tradition is to stay home and let the kids enjoy their toys. We had a small Christmas dinner and just enjoyed some family time.

We have finished up the basement, and moved the kids' toys down to the new playroom. They LOVE having their own space. They hang out playing legos and hot wheels and coloring after school and on the weekends. This gives Miguel and I some much needed time to do some organizing and purging in other rooms of the house that have been neglected recently. One of those projects has been organizing and backing up all our photos. We had pictures backed up in several locations with lots of duplicates, and it took me well over 40 hours but I'm happy to have all the digital photos backed up, and all our physical photos in one spot.

We also got to see the new Star Wars over Christmas break. The kids love Star Wars and this was the first non-cartoon movie we have seen in the theater. Danny was upset because he loves all things Dark Side, and as the movie progressed he literally turned to me in the theater and said (loudly) 'This is the worst day ever, this movie is hurting my feelings!' because the dark side was being abolished. The family behind us laughed so hard. The genuine feelings of a 6 year old. We also saw Frozen 2 which was a big hit. Elsie is always singing it, and got lots of Frozen 2 stuff for Christmas, like a singing microphone and a vanity. The boys got Legos and hot wheels.

Danny is big on 'the worst day ever' saying, and we are trying to make him see that life is good, and less complaining would make it even more awesome. Sammy is big into tattling right now and you can here the phrase 'Sam, is this an emergency?' every time he comes running at me saying 'mom! Danny/Elsie touched me/looked at me/breathed near me/etc'. I must say FIGURE IT OUT at least 50 times a day. Elsie is big on debating. And I don't want to crush her fierce, independent spirit but C'MON Elsie, just do as I say once out of every 100 and I'll be happy. But nope. Every single time she has to question it, or disagree with it. I keep telling her to stop starting every sentence with BUT, but I am getting absolutely nowhere. If I haven't said 'For the Love of God Elsie just do what I say' at least twice by 8am then you can bet she is still sleeping. She is a great mother hen to the boys though, reminding them every morning if they have gym or library, and not to forget their hat and mittens for school and take their vitamin. She loves to help and gets out their snack bags and juice boxes every day before school. My best girl.

Here are some pics and videos from the fall. Enjoy!

pajama day at school

yellow day

how lucky are we

color run at Quinn

Elsie got her ears pierced

she loves her cousin Lana

selfies out on the deck

this dog loves me

Elsie was sitting at the kitchen table and fell off her chair, she tried to catch herself on the way down and got this dinger

lucky for us it was a clean enough cut to glue

waiting for her game to start, watching her brothers

this is Danny doing his homework in September, struggling to get through a few words. He now is reading and writing sentences. Amazing the difference in a few months.

soapbox Derby. Elsie decided she didn't want to do the derby this year because she didn't win last year. She is super competitive and if she doesn't think she can guarantee a win then she doesn't want to play. We are working at if you want to win more you have to play and practice more. Ugh.

Sammy had fun

We love seeing Erin, Nick, and Ellie

Cousins

painting at Jazzy's party

the fire department had an open house and the kids had a blast

then we went to Fort Phoenix and played

Danny got a cough mid-October that wouldn't quit. He kept dropping oxygen and so the pedi sent us into the ER at Hasbro. Not sure what happened, but they triggered the sepsis protocol and rushed him to the PICU and put him on bipap and IV antibiotics. Luckily when cultures came back that was not the case so we were able to walk it back down to a regular hospital stay with oxygen support for pneumonia. But he was out of school for 2 1/2 weeks. Tough run. Was hoping to not have a hospital stay in the first 6 weeks of Kindergarten.

He did love all the one-on-one Mommy time though

This is him literally waiting to be discharged, giving the nurse the stink eye to make her hurry because he missed his siblings.

We got home on Halloween

Since Danny was Darth Vader this year which he's been waiting for years to be, we decided to let him participate and do a few streets of trick or treating.

Sammy in the school parade

Elsie as Chewbacca

waiting for Sammy and Elsie to get home so he could dress up too

trick or treating with the Collins clan

the end of soccer season

ice cream for their birthday with Rosamaria

Rosamaria and I went for ice cream just days before I delivered them. We took a picture at Cold Stone and it ended up being the last pregnancy picture I had, so we recreated it with the kids on the outside 6 years later almost to the day.

roller skating with our cousins

Visiting cousins

playing with friends

Veteran's Day parade

playing at the playground

So Elsie misbehaved at piano so I made her write an apology letter. All I see when I look at this is a ransom note. I try not to laugh but the 6 year old handwriting is great. This was a new piano teacher, and it didn't work out. All 3 of the kids didn't like her and didn't want to go to piano anymore. Good news, we tried a new piano teacher and they are back to loving piano again.

career day at school.

family selfies

we had a fun snow day

the kids decorated the SW corner of the Christmas tree lol

This was funny. Went to Home Depot for the kids workshop and surprise! Santa was there. Kids were excited and we took a pic.

Fast forward a few hours and we saw another Santa. Well Danny was quick to point out that one had blue eyes and one had brown eyes, and one had a curlier beard than the other. As I started to explain he said 'I think Santa must send elves to dress up and take pictures because he is so busy'. YES Danny, I bet you that's what he does. Whew.