We went totally low-key this year. We stayed home, no visits to or from in-laws, so we just picked a few holidayish things we wanted to do and focused on them.
As always, we had Slovak Christmas on the 24th and American Christmas on the 25th, though we dialed down the cooking on the 25th from a full Christmas dinner to a more modest Christmas brunch. Less time cooking, more time playing with toys!
Earlier in the month we experimented with making pomanders out of clementines and spices, and K enjoyed it so much that I think we'll make it a holiday tradition. We made three separate batches and gave them away as gifts. We also made sausage balls and baked gingerbread twice and I think we'll make one last batch of each for New Year's. We listened to and sang Christmas music and K managed to learn Jingle Bells as her first (English) Christmas carol.
We also went to her preschool Christmas performance where the children sang (Czech) Christmas carols they'd been practicing since mid-November. Since K spent a few weeks singing "sanáčku, panáčku" [not at all the right words] I'm thinking it was a good idea they started early, since this was most of the children's first year to be learning the carols properly!
The baby was pretty much along for the ride this Christmas - as he is for most things. I'm pretty sure K helping to open his presents and stocking won't fly in future years! Also, next year we probably won't be able to wrap up a few toys and clothes we already had for him...he did get a couple of new things though. And K has hardly taken off her purple princess dress since she opened it on Christmas Eve.
A very successful Christmas! And without driving ourselves crazy with overly ambitious plans.
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