I have come to understand that Christmas will be ever changing in the years to come. Yes it will still arrive on the same day in December and will still be a celebration of Christ’s birth. But, it will never look quite the same in any two years. Christmas will always be changing because as Siena grows up it will reflect differently in her eyes every year. It is through her eyes that we will see Christmas in the years to come.
This Christmas was one where Siena had her first encounter with a few new things. First, she discovered that trees can grow in the house. For weeks she has been pointing at trees outside as we walk and suddenly there is one in her living room. Very interesting. Then one day the tree lit up and got sparkly. Well of course, the sparkly things had some intriguing shapes and needed to be explored. Many of the shiny, sparkly things got off the tree and went for walks. Luckily they all made it back to the tree in one piece.
This Christmas was one where Siena had her first encounter with a few new things. First, she discovered that trees can grow in the house. For weeks she has been pointing at trees outside as we walk and suddenly there is one in her living room. Very interesting. Then one day the tree lit up and got sparkly. Well of course, the sparkly things had some intriguing shapes and needed to be explored. Many of the shiny, sparkly things got off the tree and went for walks. Luckily they all made it back to the tree in one piece.
Next the tree started having what appeared to be paper babies; colorful and in all different shapes and sizes. Kind of makes sense, paper comes from trees. Then one day there were tons of paper babies. This day was truly a special one.
So on this special day we got to see what a 17 month old does with Christmas presents. She stands on them, carries them around and repositions them, plays them like a drum and stacks them in piles. What she doesn’t do is open them. But, with a little help from mommy and daddy on how to operate a Christmas present she helped pull a few open. As all parents know, the paper and boxes are far more interesting than the toys inside. Why more parents don’t wrap empty boxes is beyond me. However, I believe the toys are really more for the parents anyway.
This year’s big gift was a kitchen set. Here is another thing that is new for Christmas. Gifts with what seems like 500 parts and the terminology “some assembly required” which really means a lot of things that need to be put together. The kitchen set was put together a week in advance so that Christmas Eve cocktails would not result in a poorly designed kitchen with crooked stickers. As you would expect, once the kitchen set was discovered, Christmas was over and play time began.
We opened one or two gifts on Christmas, the remainder of the gifts would come open in the following days. Christmas after all is a season, so it was extended a few more days. Later in the day we joined the Valker family for Christmas dinner. Another wonderful meal from Suz and Tom that was capped off with a homemade Peppermint Ice Cream cake! It seems we always have wonderful meal at the Valker home.
So Christmas 2010 delivered on all the things we hopes it would; friends, family, presents for Siena and a season of happiness.
