Christmas 2007 Remembered

I never realized how much I was missing out on... until Maleah came along. What a wonderful, sweet, funny, beautiful, and smart baby girl we have! Maleah loved all of her Christmas gifts. Thank you so much to everyone for them!

We found out that Maleah was scared of the sound of ripping paper. That made our grand vision of her ripping into the presents dissolve quickly. No matter. She still enjoyed her presents and hugged them and smiled when she got something. The best part was when we asked her to say "Thank you" she would; it wasn't perfectly clear, but you could understand what she was saying.

She was so good everywhere we went. She smiled and talked at every stop we had. She allowed people to hold her and walk her around and visit. I just love how good she is. The only point where she got fussy was at Grandma and Grandpa Parson's house. She got mad that I wouldn't let her go wherever she wanted; that particular point it was straight for someones drink.

Miranda and I exchanged gifts and we both got each other good presents. The best gift really was watching Maleah play with her toys. I've cried many times since she was born - due to lack of sleep, because I was proud of her, because I missed her so much - but I didn't cry when she opened gifts. It truly made me happy to see her enjoy her toys, but it wasn't the toys themselves, but the baby who was quickly becoming a toddler before our eyes. She pushed buttons on a toy, mimicked sounds they made, and at that moment seemed so independent; yet so helpless at the same time.

Me, Miranda, Cindy, Dusty, John and Gary got mom a ring with all of her kids' names on it (Bob, Cindy, Gary, John) and she cried. It was sweet to see her appreciate it that much.

It was a relaxed, slow paced Christmas for us... Yeah, right. It was really "one thing after another" on the 24th and 25th. We were late everywhere we went Christmas Eve and ended up missing our Christmas Eve service at church because I left the diaper bag at Grandma and Grandpa Speakman's house. Maleah got hungry and we had to go straight home. We shook it off (for the most part) and got things ready at mom's house for our final Christmas Eve stop. The whole evening went well over there and we all had a good time.

Christmas Day was a little odd. We opened presents at Butch and Annie's old house for the very last time. The walls were mostly bare and many things were already moved. We then immediately broke down the tree, packed ornaments and decorations into totes and took down the lights. We went from Christmas to December 26 in about 2 hours - if that. They're moving the rest of their stuff into the new house this week. The closing is on Friday!

All in all it was a wonderful Christmas. It was busy and it was less than perfect. Much like the first Christmas. It was busy - Mary and Joseph searching for somewhere to stay, but there was no room at the inn. It wasn't perfect - the Savior arrived into the world in a stinky stable and was placed in an animal's feeding trough. I complained too much and took the time for granted - and now its gone. It went too fast as it always does. Now just 364 days and it is here again!