The Wednesday before their Christmas break started, the kids participated in their school's annual Christmas concert. Both kids did a fantastic job and had so much fun. Annika sang with her 6th grade class, with the entire middle school, and as part of the student choir. Conor sang with his 4th grade class and as part of the student choir; he also played drums as during the beginning band's performances.
Once Christmas break began, we (very happily) eased up on life's accelerator pedal and sloooooowed way down. I had to burn time off from work, so was home with the kids throughout their entire break. Eric's office closed from Christmas Eve until January 2nd. It was marvelous to have all of us home and able to catch our collective breath. We played countless games and Conor even took up playing cribbage! (Yes, he is VERY proud to let everyone know that he not only learned how to play but skunked me ... LEGIT skunked me)
You KNOW we did plenty of baking and cookie-based activities over the break. There are a few required cookies that MUST make an appearance to celebrate Christmas: shortbread (I make those soon after Halloween so they can season .. easy one!), krumkake (Norwegian cookies that I learned how to make from Eric's mom waaaaaaay back in the day), pizzelles (a family tradition from my childhood), sugar cookies, and spritz cookies. (No shortage of sweets, let me tell you!!)
Just to make sure we had some contact with the outside world (and I forgot to get it done earlier in the fall), I got the kids in for their annual eye exams. Annika's Rx didn't change, so her existing reading glasses were still good to use. Conor was told he'd benefit from reading glasses, so he picked out some frames (strong, flexible ones geared for kids) and we got them ordered.
Christmas was chaotic, energetic, and so much fun! On Christmas Eve, the kids were altar servers at mass. While we were there, Eric made dinner (this year, it was breakfast sliders) ... because he's a rock star! We were even treated with some extended family members (Anna and Robert) joining us for dinner. Win!!
Christmas morning was just the four of us. We opened stockings and presents, and then gobbled up the traditional Olson family Christmas Breakfast casserole. (SO GOOD!) Later in the morning, Eric's parents came over for part 2 of Christmas presents and game times. A little after noon, we were joined by my brother (Troy), sister-in-law (Staci), and niece (Kat), as well as Eric's best friend (Dave) for more celebrating and a big family dinner. We were all in a food coma by the end of dinner, but in a good way!
For New Year's Eve, we were invited by another CKS family to ring in the East Coast new year, which was lovely and not too late! Three CKS families were there (including ours) and the kids were practically bouncing off of the walls with their play and bubbling energy. Together, we said goodbye to 2019 and hello to 2020!
Each year, the Olson Four attend the Woodland Park Zoo's WildLights display. We've learned a few things over the years - avoid going on a weekend, and going after Christmas helps reduce the crowd factor. We even managed to avoid getting rained on.... WIN! (During our traditional Zeek's Pizza dinner, we told the kids about our plans to visit Hawaii later this year. They could hardly believe it! We toyed with the idea of not telling them until closer to the trip, but thought they're old enough that they might want a voice in planning some of our activities. Now they are anxiously awaiting .... the long wait has begun!)
As January progressed, we started seeing snowflakes appear on our weather forecast app. We have learned after many years of snow being predicted and never showing up that holding our breath for a true snowfall is a fool's errand. This year, the forecast was (eventually) right. A few of the snowflake days didn't produce anything but disappointment, but Mother Nature eventually came through.
Annika spent the better part of two days playing in the snow with her friend Maddy (notice a lack of photos of Annika in the snow - we barely saw her!). Conor enjoyed some R&R at home, but did decide to do a little manual labor to earn some spending money for Hawaii. (Smart kid!)
Little did we know that our biggest snow fan would be Huck! He LOVED the snow and wanted to be in it (usually eating it) all of the time. We made him come inside to thaw every so often and he was anything but a fan of that approach. Whenever we'd bring him inside, he'd sit by the door looking at the snow and whining asking to go back out into it. He ate the snow, chased snowballs, laid in the snow (while eating the snow), and dug in the snow. We have a snow pup!
The kids' school was closed Monday and Tuesday, and had a 2-hour delayed start yesterday. After one last mini snow "blizzard" yesterday afternoon, our temps are now on the rise and most of the snow has melted. Much to our kids' chagrin this morning, they went to school on time and without nearly enough snow on the ground for their liking.
