Nicholas and the Nativity

We may need to work on the theology of Christmas a little more.

This is the nativity scene Nicholas made using stickers at the St. Nick party at church:

From 2011 December

While the baby Jesus flying in from the sky could work, the decapitated cow and the camel going in to kiss Mary are a little less orthodox.

Similarly, his main comment regarding our nativity scene at home is, "We don't blow down baby Jesus' house."

He has a real fascination with the big bad wolf these days. Luckily our apartment building is made of brick, so I was easily able to put aside his fears on our own account. Baby Jesus' stable, however, has elicited much concern. Well, concern that alternates with efforts for Nicholas to get a head start on the big bad wolf by huffing and puffing.

Life Imitates Art

And occasionally, life imitates art on several levels.

To wit: a teacher in New York State got caught saying something you don't say to your classroom full of second-graders.

And then watch this video:



Sorry, not about Nicholas, but I couldn't resist.

When Daddy Gets Home

Rumor has it that a substantial and growing list of activities awaits my return to Massachusetts this evening. Sarah has apparently decided (and rightly so, in most of the cases she cited) that there's simply not enough time during the week to take care of all of the things that Nicholas wants to do, so she's started telling him that these tasks have to wait until Daddy comes home.

And if it makes me the Cool Dad, so much the better. (That myth is going to go "poof!" all too soon as it is.)

So when I get home, I have to make a CD with "Dominick the Donkey" on it ("for Mommy's car"), help put lights out on our balcony (since everyone else has them), put up the Christmas tree. Of course, that's not even counting what's on the honey-do list.

Ahem.

Oddly enough, there's precedent for this sort of interaction between me and small children. When I first left for college, Uncle Patrick was still a little tyke. He liked to ask questions. Why this? How come that? "Wait for Joe to come home," my parents and other brothers would patiently answer, both to relieve themselves of the obligation to answer and to entertain themselves with what they imagined would be the deluge. Made for an interesting Thanksgiving my freshman year.

In the meantime, if Nicholas thinks I'm a hero for burning "Dominick" onto a CD, who am I to complain?

Found it!

Corduroy's Christmas Surprise has been found! It was apparently still in my backpack from our last airplane trip. This is what I get for not unpacking all the way in between trips.

You may all now return to the rest of your day.

Advent

Advent is a big hit in our house. Nicholas will repeat back that we are waiting for Christmas, but he doesn't really get that part. What he gets is that we get to light a candle every night at dinner and sing a special Advent song. Oh, man, has that kid latched onto the Advent song. How long do you think until he knows all the words?

Tonight was the second night of Advent candles and Nicholas has spent a good 10-15 minutes at each dinner giving a long soliloquy about how he can't blow a candle away but he can blow the fire away, and other such very informative insights into the nature of candles. I don't think it is a coincidence that he hasn't been eating much dinner. I mean, really, who has time to eat when you have to opine on the nature of candles?

Just wait until Thursday when we break out the Advent calendar and he gets to add opening a flap and chocolate to the Advent routine! Toddler heaven.

Lost in the Mess

Our house is a mess. I know this. I figure that I get a break this semester. After all, if I'm working 50+ hours a week and single parenting, the fact that I pack our lunches every day, we eat out only once every 2 weeks, I do the dishes every day, I do the laundry each week, and there is no food or other actually gross mess around is enough. And clutter is just going to be a part of our life.

These arguments were all pretty convincing to me. Until this weekend. When I discovered that I can't find anything in this mess! I was certain Corduroy's Christmas Surprise was in the black diaper bag. Certain. But when we went to pull it out in NY, it wasn't there. I was annoyed but figured we'd get home and I'd see it sitting on the floor right next to where the bag had been, removed by a little helper. Nope. And I've searched the house. It is nowhere to be found.

It isn't really about the book. I did a quick search and I can get copies on Amazon starting at a penny. But we have the book. Somewhere. It has to be in this house. Or in the car. How can I be that person whose house is so cluttered that I can't find a book?

I also spent half an hour last night looking for matches to light the Advent candles, only to eventually give up and go buy a lighter. That I blame on the move, however.

I also spent 20 minutes last night searching for the mug Joe got as a groomsman's gift from Brian and Shayna last month that I didn't remember unpacking and was worried was sitting in the bottom of a bag waiting to be smashed. It turns out I actually did unpack it and put it in the last place I thought to check--the hutch with all the nice glasses. Exactly where it belongs.

So I'm hoping Corduroy shows up on Nicholas' bookshelf and I was just blind to it the 4 times I checked. Not because I don't want to spend the penny to replace it. But because I'm starting to doubt my sanity.

We have got to get this house cleaned up!

Christmas Decorating, Day 1

Grandma Alice loves Christmas. I mean loves Christmas. And Nicholas has been begging to "make a Christmas tree" and see a gingerbread house since he became obsessed with Corduroy's Christmas Surprise back in early fall. So Joe asked his mom if there would be any Christmas decorating that Nicholas could help with over Thanksgiving weekend.

And oh boy was there. Most of Grandma Alice's normal Christmas decorations are way too fragile for a pint-sized helper. But Grandma Alice got Nicholas some very special Nicholas-sized decorations to work on.

Nicholas' first surprise was a 4-ft tree set up for him in the basement. Grandma and an uncle or two set up the tree and got the lights on before bringing Nicholas down. And his face just lit up when he saw it!

From 2011 November

He then went right to work, putting on every single ornament that had been laid out.

From 2011 November

He then asked about the box of candy canes that were there. And all it took was someone saying they could be hung on the tree too and he was on a mission.

From 2011 November

He did all of this by himself (okay, except the bow on top):

From 2011 November

Just as the adults had decided that this looked good and maybe we should just skip the garland, Nicholas saw it. And there was no going back. His first attempt to do it himself was, while hilarious, not very productive. So Aunt Melinda helped him and they got it wrapped around the tree nicely.

From 2011 November

The tree looked just as pretty when we left this morning, although not the same. Nicholas has rearranged the ornaments and candy canes (especially the candy canes) at least a half dozen times in the past 3 days. But he does it carefully and methodically and enjoys it, so why not? Given this, however, this year we might want to just skip any breakable ornaments on our tree so he is free to re-decorate at will.

After decorating the tree there were still more fun Christmas surprises in store for our very lucky little boy.

A real gingerbread house!

Grandma Alice bought a gingerbread kit and Aunt Melinda took on the bulk of the work of helping Nicholas decorate it.

I cut out the fondant for the windows and doors to the right size and we pointed to the general area where they should go (which was also designated by lines on the gingerbread), but Nicholas put them on. He also picked the pieces of candy he wanted and put them on after Melinda dotted frosting on the backs.

From 2011 November

From 2011 November

Nicholas did discover pretty early on that the "glue" was yummy frosting and so was intentionally wiping it off the candy pieces and liking his fingers. Sneaky.

From 2011 November

We had to re-glue some of them.

The grownups put the house together and Melinda and I did the piping for the roof lines, but Nicholas did the bulk of the gumdrops.

From 2011 November

Putting them on the roofline was my idea, but he carefully placed them all neatly in the line. (Watch the video below to see the excitement.)

From 2011 November

From 2011 November

It is so fun watching him do projects, now that he is old enough to really get them and enjoy them. And he is such a careful and mellow 2-year-old that it is feasible to let him.

Nicholas loves looking at the gingerbread house, but he has also asked to eat it a couple times. Technically it is edible, but I'm not so sure I'd want to eat it. Maybe we'll make some gingerbread cookies to eat closer to Christmas instead.

We'll be back again in 2 weeks for the extended family Christmas party, so Nicholas can see "his" tree and gingerbread house again soon. We also left the other Christmas-themed goodies that Grandma bought there, to be rediscovered on our next visit. I don't think I need to pack any toys. :)

And, best of all, as we read our knock-off Corduroy's Christmas Surprise last night (I couldn't find the real book in his bag even though I was certain it was packed, so I made him one), he stopped when we got to the part about decorating the tree and exclaimed, "Corduroy decorated a tree like I decorated a tree!" And, if possible, even more excitedly proclaimed when we reached the next page, "Dolly made a gingerbread house like I made a gingerbread house! That was so much fun!"

The next month is going to be one new exciting thing after another for him. He's working on a bunch of Christmas songs, trying really hard to learn the exclamations in Rudolph and figuring out what each of the songs on our Christmas CDs "is about." Currently he likes Frosty because it is about a snowman and we built a snowman, Rudolph because he loves the exclamations (especially "ho ho ho" and "yippee"), and "The Little Drummer Boy," because "it is about a little boy like I am a little boy."

2 is simultaneously such an awful age and such a wonderful age. I guess this wonder and joy and excitement is there to balance out the stubbornness and boundary testing. As I have said before, God knew what He was doing when he made little kids cute.