The "Ginch", Cookie Elf and Christmas 2011

A Christmas post would have been much more timely, oh, in December.  But we've had trees to un-decorate, schedules to figure get back into, presents to play with.  You know-- important stuff!


Christmas 2011 will be known to us as the Christmas Thomas Henry learned of the "Ginch" and immediately was distrustful of the green character who steals little kids' Christmas presents.  He refused to watch the movie or the cartoon and instead would listen to the song, "You're a Mean One, Mr. Grinch" over and over asking me, "Is that Ginch going to take my presents?"  His dad came up with the best answer in that the Ginch lives in Whoville and therefore did not live in Ohio and would not be visiting our town or our home very soon.  


Santa used to be on the "distrust" list, but this year slowly creeped into a better standing in Tommy's eyes.  Chuck. E. Cheese (or as Tommy calls him "That Big Mouse") remains firmly planted on his do not trust list and I don't completely blame him.  For some reason, he is also not a fan of the Fed Ex or UPS delivery people.  I think they knock a little too loudly and aggressively for Tommy's taste.

I can only imagine what Tommy is telling Joey....

Christmas 2011 will also be known as the year my baby brother graduated early from college and the fun weekend we spent drinking wine and toasting his collegiate success as well as his future endeavors.

It will be known as the Christmas Joey started to really, really, really try to crawl.  He was doing a large swimming motion during most of the holidays and has recently perfected it into an actual "Army Crawl".  Go baby, go!

This was the Christmas Cookie Elf entered our lives and gave my husband and I something to giggle about every night.  It was all fun and games with Cookie until he was knocked off a fireplace at my parent's house by one of the mini helicopters I gave to all the boys and they all stood there in shocked silence as my nieces and Tommy witnessed Cookie Elf's descent onto the floor. We later learned that an enterprising uncle told them that if he picked up Cookie by his tag,  it was not considered "touching" him which would have caused him to lose his magic (read the book if this sounds like witchcraft).  

That is Cookie sitting up on the middle of my parent's fireplace and that is
the helicopter in the top of the shot.

2011's holiday season will be remembered by a trip on the Polar Express with precious friends.

It will be remembered as fun and silly days and evenings with cousins from both sides of the family and the first year that Tommy really understood just how much fun cousins are and how cool they are to hang out with.  Thankfully they have amazing cousins of all ages who dote on them and look out for them both.

It is the year that Tommy was old enough for his turn to put Baby Jesus into the manger at Grammy and G-Pa's house.

2011's Christmas will be remembered as the holiday where we celebrated a year in which Joey conquered his open heart surgery and turned one.  A year in which Tommy started pre-school and started becoming a little boy instead of a toddler.  A year in which we learned just how strong we were and how with help from family and friends we were that much stronger.  A year we met inspiring and amazing friends-- some with an extra chromosome and some without.  A year of joy.