Celebrating Christmas From Across the Country

Since it's unlikely we'll be dragging the kids across the country for Christmas again since it's pure torture and terribly stressful while they are little as well as awfully expensive at the holidays - we celebrate with Grammy and Pappy Chooch by sending gifts through the mail.

This year Pappy Chooch sent the kids these awesome doodle boards that use a stylis pen and erase with the touch of a button!  They will be great for travel in the car.  Riley also got an awesome railroad pocket watch.  It's a Pennsy (PRR) watch and the best part...It was made by Hamilton Watch where my grandfather worked in our hometown of Lancaster, PA!  Kendall received a cute Barbie pocket sized radio with headphones.  She dances around the house while playing tunes!

Grammy gave the kids some special gifts too!  Riley received some new video games for his DS player.  He was thrilled with Transformers and Kung Fu Panda to add to his collection.  He also received a Bumble Bee Transformer KREO (Lego) set.  He had Bumble Bee assembled in less than 30 min!

Since Kendall received a Leap Frog Tag reader from Santa, Grammy thought it would be nice to add to her collection of books to read with it.  She gave Kendall a Cinderella and a Tangled book as well as a pack of 6 phonics books.  Kendall loves to listen to the stories with her tag reader.  This way she can "read" books during her rest time in the afternoons.  Grammy also gave Kendall a friend for Strawberry Shortcake.  She got Plum Pudding and was so thrilled!

It's difficult, as you can imagine, to live far away from our families.  It is very unlikely we would ever move back "home" so we have to try to create the best environment for our kids with the time we have at the holidays.  The best part is that it has made us a very close-knit family.  We spend a lot of time together and actually get to enjoy our time together, especially with Andy's crazy travel schedule.  We're not over scheduled, trying to visit everyone or attend every family function.  We have time to stop and actually enjoy the season.  The sad thing is that our kids won't have the same type of memories of the holidays as I had growing up.  Each holiday was spent the same way every year with extended family included in most of them.

Our kids ended up having a great Christmas and are very blessed little munchkins.  They feel very loved by all choose to be a part of their lives no matter where they live.  We are grateful for technology like this blog, skype, facebook and now facetime to better keep in touch with our loved ones.

It's sad that the kids don't get to see their Grammy and Pappy Chooch more often, but we try to do the best we can with the resources we have.  The kids haven't seen them since June and we don't know when they will see them again.  But thankfully Grammy and Pappy Chooch are often included in their prayers.  Kendall has had numerous pretend phone conversations with Pappy Chooch on her little Minnie Mouse play phone.  They are a part of our lives even if we don't get to see them often.