Merry Christmas 2010

After a rocky start on Christmas Eve Day with too much to do, we had a great Christmas. The official festivities started out right with St. Francis' annual Christmas Pagaent complete with live animals and lots of family. Evan, Liam, Greg, and Cousin Hazel were all in this year's production. Evan and Liam's roles are obvious from the pictures. Greg was the Archangel Gabriel and had several powerful lines. Hazel debuted as Baby Jesus.

The pageant had some drama this year, courtesy of a new donkey with some stage fright. The very gentle and large donkey took her time making her way up the aisle of the church, turned around, did a large amount of "business" in front of Mary and Jesus, and headed out of the sanctuary in embarassment. Cousin Henry promptly announced, "He pooped!" followed by Liam's statement, "It smells!" The farmers discreetly covered up the poop and had it cleaned up by communion.

The show went on very smoothly. Hazel decided to play the part of Jesus with some fussiness for authenticity, and she did such a good job that Meg had rescue her before the pageant was over. Fortunately, she had an understudy in Rev. Jill's son, Jude, who immediately replaced her in Mary's arms and continued the role in the same vein.

After church, we headed to our house for Christmas Eve dinner and gifts. Liam was so happy with all of his presents and stated joyfully, "I hit the jackpot!" The cousins had lots of fun playing together, and Liam keeled over on the sofa after about 10 minutes of Santa Claus Is Coming to Town."

On Christmas morning, the boys both slept until about 7 AM and patiently waited for Finbar to have his walk before opening their gifts. Despite my worries that the gifts lacked a certain pizaaz this year, the boys seemed thrilled with their haul of mostly Star Wars themed items. While there are lots of new toys, we noted that the toys were much easier to get out of the packaging and smaller now that they are older. We have lots of fun in store for our week of school vacation and impending snow.

Thanks to everyone who gave the boys such wonderful gifts and Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!