Everly 7 Months + Christmas Musings

 

Let's begin the new year with this cute face. This is Everly Claire at seven months old. Since she turned seven months on January 1st, it's fitting to begin this new post with her.

At this time, Everly is a little lady with fierce determination and a smile that will melt your heart! She started rolling from back to belly on November 8, 2013, while our family stayed in a hotel near Bryce Canyon in Utah. A few short days later, she learned to roll from belly to back. Since then, she's been gaining strength in her back to sit up, though she still tends to lose balance occasionally and bonks her head on the carpet when we're not paying attention.

We just spent two weeks (basically) with family visiting from Utah, Arizona, and Oregon, so both Clarke and Everly were spoiled with attention! I'm pretty sure Everly misses it. I am hardly out of her sight when she begins to cry. She's also probably sensitive because her teeth are coming out. Right now she's at two, and I'm sure within the next month she'll get one or two more.

On Christmas Break
Franco, Clarke, Everly and I spent a leisurely Christmas Eve and Christmas here in Guadalupe, Ca last year. We decided not to travel on those days for a few reasons. One, we felt the need to begin our own family traditions in our own home, as the last seven years were always spent with family in their homes. Two, we knew we were going to travel to Camarillo for New Year's, so it didn't make sense to make two trips in two weeks. Three, we refrained from participating in gift exchanges this year, including Christmas, in order to refocus on Christ during the holidays and share experiences, rather than things, with friends and family. I'll write a post about that a little later. Our Christmas at home was low key but special. We also got to video call with Elder Mosiah Castrejon that morning. We used Google Hangouts on the iPad and conferenced in the Porters and Elder Castrejon in Montreal. What a treat! Mosiah shared some key experiences and he marvelled at how much the girls and Clarke had changed. He also got to meet Everly for the first time.

Everly contracted her first illness the day before Christmas Eve. We were in Santa Barbara spending time with the Castrejons when her fever started. It wouldn't subside but with the holidays we couldn't take her to the doctor. I am afraid her first Christmas was pretty miserable. Finally on Friday the 26th I was able to take her to see the doctor here in Guadalupe who diagnosed a throat infection and prescribed antibiotics. Little by little she recovered both her health and her strength, and thankfully by New Year's she was back to her normal cheery self.

Christmas Advent Calendar List- 25 Activities for Decembering & Remembering

So, not surprisingly to me, I failed at posting the rest of our Christmas Advent calendar activities last month. Partly because we skipped a few of them or I didn't take photos, and partly because I just got busy and was too lazy to post. But the unfinished series was still bugging me almost halfway into January so I thought I'd do a comprehensive post and just list our daily activities, whether we actually did them or not.

If we skipped a day or two, we combined them into one or left it for a more convenient time. (The Christmas lights, for example, we left for a relaxed Sunday night.)

Our family is LDS, belonging to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and therefore a few of the items on this list refer to things or places relating to our church. However, they are open and available to all Christians and all other faithful people who need spiritual enlightenment in addition to fun-filled activities during the month of December. In the paragraph below the list I link to more information about a particular item on the list if it relates to our church.

Feel free download this list and save it for later this year. Because we all know December sneaks up behind us before we're ready for it! We looked forward to opening the little white envelope each day and it truly did change our attitudes during the Christmas season. We focused more on what we had rather than what we thought we needed. Health, family, and a handsome boy to keep us feeling young! That's all we needed.

2. The First Presidency Christmas Devotional is always held in the late afternoon on the first Sunday of December. Our prophet and his counselors speak about Christmastime and Jesus Christ and the Mormon Tabernacle Choir graces us with beautiful Christmas music.

5. Scriptures about Jesus Christ.

13. Christmas Hymns.

14. LDS temples.

25. Luke 2

Yuletide With The Castrejons, Part III

Christmas day with my family was so relaxing. We had a handmade Christmas gift exchange, and it was so fun to see the thoughtfulness each family member put into their gifts for the other person. I was able to build my dad a website for his music, and had business cards printed for him to pass out at conventions and shows and stuff. After enjoying a delicious breakfast while listening to Luke 2 (the Christmas story in the Bible), gift-exchanging, and game-playing, we took a quick family portrait because my eldest brother Charlie had to work at Golf-N-Stuff. Boo. But otherwise, it was a beautiful day.

Yuletide With The Castrejons, Part II

Christmas with Franco's family is always fun. Our three nieces are smitten with Clarke and don't seem to care one bit that he's a boy. They share their play food with him, serve him pretend tea, and give him their dolls to hold. I loved watching Clarke enjoy his first Christmas. In the future, I hope to be able to host festivities in our home, but for now, I have loved the traditions we have started with our families. I'm grateful to live near both our wonderful immediate families and share these memories with them.

Yuletide With The Castrejons.

I am alone (with a napping boy) for a bit at my parent's house in Camarillo right now, after everyone else left to do this or that within a half hour of each other. A good time to catch up on the past few days of merrymaking, I told myself, so here it goes. Let's see how far I get.

Christmas morning (on the 24th) at our house before heading to Camarillo for the week!

Finally made Clarke's mini stocking. ^^

Now THAT's an expression of an excited boy opening his gift. ^^

 (He could tell it was legos from the sound the box made when he picked it up.)

Next, Christmas Eve at the Porter's with Franco's family.

Merry Christmas, from Franco, Anelieze, & Clarke!

 

Christmas Tree Bokeh Shapes

I've always wanted to do this and tried it out on our Christmas tree one night. It was fun cutting out little shapes out of paper and holding them up to the camera lens to see what would happen. The lights on the Christmas tree created hearts, triangles, and squares through the little holes once I opened the aperture as big as it could go and switched it to manual focus. It explains how to do it step by step here.

Christmas Advent Calendar: Day 10

Make the best hot chocolate in the world. Enjoy with some sweet treats.

For us, the best hot chocolate is chocolate Abuelita. We drank some with the pumpkin empanadas I made on Sunday. Yuuuuum.

Christmas Advent Calendar: Day 9

Write and mail out Christmas cards to far-away family and friends.
I had to limit it to only far-away people to make it easier on myself.
Otherwise it would never get done.

Christmas Advent Calendar: Day 8

We were originally going ice skating, but then we were invited to an Ugly Christmas Sweater party at Franco's school-friend's house. We bought our ugly sweaters at Goodwill, set up a babysitter, and had us some delicious dinner and fun with fellow classmates. Yup. Much more fun than paying too much to ice skate in a tiny fake rink in the middle of Southern California.

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Christmas Advent Calendar: Day 7

Build a gingerbread house.
I don't care if we're grown adults and that we waited until Clarke was asleep to do this! It was fun! Harder than it seems (that icing did not keep the walls together), but fun.

Christmas Advent Calendar: Day 6

Hang mistletoe, real or made out of felt, like the one below.

{credit}

Christmas Advent Calendar: Day 5

Read and share your favorite scripture about Jesus Christ.

There are several activities in our calendar which focus on the true meaning of Christmas, our Savior Jesus Christ. I love this one especially!

Christmas Advent Calendar: Day 4

The day got away from us yesterday, and we ended up doing days four and five today.

Day 4 is "Write and send a note to someone special far away." We decided to write a friend who is serving a mission for our church in Washington, D.C. It's his first Christmas away so we thought a little note from home would make him feel special during the Christmas season.

Christmas Advent Calendar: Day 3

Write a list of Christmas gifts you'd like to give instead of receive, and then do/give them. I plan to do this for my family members and neighbors throughout the rest of the year.

Christmas Advent Calendar: Day 2

Watch the inspiring LDS First Presidency Christmas Devotional

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The First Day Of Christmas: Get A Christmas Tree

Well, hello December! Our family is excited to celebrate the season with a new (to us) tradition: an advent calendar of activities throughout the month of December, from now until Christmas. I'll do my best to document and post about our activities each day!

It was Clarke's first time seeing a Christmas tree and when he saw it all lit up, his eyes got huge and he couldn't stop smiling. I think babies especially can feel the spirit of Christmas so strong. The joy is incredibly apparent in their expressions and excitement. I love experiencing things like this because it's as though I'm experiencing it for the first time! Are you doing an advent calendar this year? Or are you following any other traditions with your family?