The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

Historically Christmas has not ended up being the most wonderful time of the year in Bobby's World. It has been just plain old overwhelming for him and disappointing for Mommy and Daddy.  It's hard to watch as something that is that is supposed to be magical, exciting, special and full of joy for children be just the opposite for your child.

This year was different!!!!  For the first Christmas of Bobby's life......he enjoyed it!!  Our beautiful boy had fun.  ZERO behavioral issues.  NO CHRISTMAS MELTDOWNS.....the greatest gift that this Mommy ever has received.

We added a new activity to our pre-Christmas agenda this year.  Grandma Carolyn, Aunt Mimi and Mommy took Bobby to Morris Park in Fairmont  to drive through their Christmas light display.

 FYI....it's very difficult to get decent pictures of Christmas lights in a moving car!!

 One of my favorite displays because it reminds me of Bobby....a gingerbread man jumping on a trampoline.  He and Bobby would be the best of friends!!

This was the overwhelming favorite of all of us in our car.....the ice skaters.  I'm not 100% sure, but I think that the adults enjoyed looking at the lights even more than Bobby!!

We did something a little different in regards to gifts this year for Bobby.  To help alleviate some of the overwhelmingness of Christmas morning, we gave him some of his gifts little by little starting at Thanksgiving.

An Elmo Christmas light display.  Bobby opened it right up and wanted it out of the box.  We added Elmo to our back porch decorations so that Bobby could see him all of the time.

The next gift came on a Saturday evening when Bobby was B.O.R.E.D.  I got out a DVD from his Santa stash, wrapped it up and presented it to him.  Again, he immediately sat down and opened it up.

He watched it multiple times and his evening was saved.   The next gifts made it out for the beginning of Christmas break when he was again.....bored.

Daddy and I were getting super excited by this point because Bobby opened each gift immediately and was interested in all of his gifts.  The kinetic sand kept him entertained for three days!!!!

We finally made it to Christmas eve and were off to our traditional dinner and gift exchange at Grandma's house.  This year was a packed house.  13 people in total expected......gave me a little bit of panic that Bobby would not be able to tolerate this much family together time.  We ended up staying at Grandma's for almost 5 hours.  5 HOURS!!  No meltdowns, no crying, no hitting, no anything bad!!  Bobby even let me pose him for some pictures!!

Bobby and Grandma

Bobby's cousins, Ashley and Kait with Grandma.  Yes, Grandma was in her glory with everyone home.

 Thankfully, my family "gets" Bobby.  There are no family rules or expectations that he is expected to follow during family get togethers.  For me and my family, this is not the time or place to work on eating issues.  So for Bobby, his Christmas Eve dinner was Cheese-its and french fries.  He even got to stand up instead of sitting down at a table set for 10.  No added pressure needed for Bobby when he is in a house full of people.

For a special dinner treat, a glass or two of Grandma's iced tea (yes, I regretted this decision when he was awake from 2-5 am)!!!!  The rest of us had prime rib, shrimp scampi, salad, green beans, asparagus, baked potato and broccoli casserole.  (FYI, I just put the food list so that we would remember for next  year...it's amazing that you don't remember this a year later!!).

After dinner was over and the dishes were washed, the party moved into the living room for gifts. Again, Bobby obliged and had some family pictures taken.

Bobby with Me Me Me (Aunt Mimi).....

When Bobby was presented with a gift, he sat down and opened it up!!  

 He even opened Daddy's gift...

After the gifts were open and half of the guests left, Daddy and I even got to sit down and play a game with the family.

We left soon after to get home and get ready for Santa's arrival.  Bobby was wired from drinking so much iced tea.....

Yes, apparently you just go ahead and drink from the pitcher.  Make sure to get every last drop!!  He finally fell asleep and we went back downstairs to see if Santa had arrived....he did and Zoi was making sure that the gifts were protected!!!

 Zoi did a good job, the gifts were still there when Bobby came downstairs.

For the first time ever, he sat down and started opening.  We didn't have to eat breakfast first, we didn't have to give any prompting, he just sat down and started opening.  

He did this until they were all opened.  After all of his gifts were opened, he helped out Zoi and opened hers...

I just can't even get over this!!  Who is this kid opening all of these gifts??!!!  He didn't stop there, he opened Mommy's gifts too!

 I wonder what he is thinking....."Poor Mommy gets pajamas and slippers....No toys!"

He made it through the pile of gifts to be opened and settled down to eat some breakfast.  A true Christmas morning mess was made and Mommy and Daddy could not have been happier.

 Zoi's worn out, but not too worn out to help Bobby eat his toast.....

Time for Mommy to clean up the mess and for Bobby to start playing with his new toys.

After a little rest it was time to prepare brunch for our Christmas Day company.  Grandma, Uncle Tom, Ashley and Kait arrived to eat and exchange the rest of our gifts.

Bobby was too excited playing with his new toys to sit down and eat, plus he already had breakfast. I was just happy that he was playing with his new things, he didn't have to let them hang around the house for a couple of months until they were old and part of his landscape.

Time to open the rest of the gifts!!!!  Of course, Bobby first....

 Bobby's music teacher from school told me to get that boy a guitar!!  I know NOTHING about guitars.  With a little help we found that you order them from online music stores for comparable prices to the toys ones that are sold in the toy departments.

 He looks like he knows what he is doing, but none of us know how to help him!!  LOL!!  He seems to really like it and has spent a lot of time playing with it, but he prefers it laying on the floor while he strums.

Bobby let me take more pictures of him with his cousins....

We had to give Grandma one of her gifts backwards because Bobby had helped himself earlier and opened it too!!  Guess that I won't be able to leave any wrapped gifts hanging around anymore!!  LOL!!  I would rather have this problem than him not want to open any gifts.

Bobby's cousins, my nieces, did a great job of getting gifts for Bobby.  Kait got him cool fidget that I personally have been playing with since it was opened too.  FYI, a fidget is a something that persons with sensory processing disorder use to keep their hands and mouth occupied so that they aren't chewing on clothing, picking at furniture, etc.  Bobby especially likes these types of things in his hands while riding in the car.

Ashley was ordering some road signs while at work and thought.....PERFECT gift for Bobby....I can order him his own stop sign!!  Another FYI....Bobby is fascinated with and loves road signs.

It also has a post for Daddy to put Bobby's stop sign in our playground....as soon as the ground warms up.  Bobby finished opening up the gifts....

All of the gifts were opened, brunch was over and we were all worn out.  Bobby was playing with his toys but the rest of the crew vegged out in front of the tv for a while....

Bobby wanted to go for a "ride in car" as since he had been so awesome, we obliged and took him for a small ride for him to veg out too.  Grandma said that she wanted to go to Oglebay Resort and see their Festival of Lights while her granddaughters were still here, have some family fun.  We decided that we would go Christmas evening and if we were going to go, we should leave soon.  The boys declined the invitation to go and opted to stay on the couch and watch tv and they had plenty of leftovers for dinner.  The girls and Bobby loaded in the car and headed north.  We decided that we would stop and eat on the way.  BAD IDEA....not even a McDonald's open for dinner.  We had our Christmas dinner at Sheetz!!  You know, these crazy things are what make memories that last a lifetime.

We made it to Oglebay, drove around and saw the lights.  We had an hour + drive home, perfect for Bobby.  Got home and ready for bed.  We had the perfect Christmas.  We could not have asked for a more perfect holiday.  Hopefully this is just the beginning of a lifetime full of great Christmas's.

Our Pinterest Christmas

It's Bob's turn to be sick in the Smith household.  I am so ready for this winter to be OVER!!!  What to do, what to do, what to do while Bob is in bed sleeping.  Hummmm.  Running the vacuum is out...too bad, that would have been big fun!!  I really am trying hard to be quiet.  I'm already bored watching TV.  It's way to cold to go shopping and get in and out of the car.  I'll have to go out soon enough to pick up Bobby from school and take him to occupational therapy before heading home.  Finally, I started looking through pictures on my computer and decided that I would sit down and blog about our Pinterest Christmas.

It all started in autumn when my mom saw a picture of some homemade snowmen on Pinterest that she said that she wanted.  Me:  "I'll make them for you for your Christmas present!!"  A minute later into the conversation, we decided that we would make homemade presents for everyone this year for Christmas (except for Bobby).  Afterall, why are we pinning all of these things on Pinterest if we aren't going to do anything with them!!

The snowmen were the first crafts that I made.  The crazy part is that I really enjoyed making them.  Bob had to help me because I needed wood cut.  He looked at the directions and said that we had that size lumber leftover from our pool deck.  Even better, it had been left outside for the past 2 years so it already had the weathered look that we were looking for!!  He cut the boards to the specific sizes and we had enough lumber to make three snowmen without buying anything.  Score!!  Bob even went downstairs and found a gallon of paint that was perfect for the snowmen again without buying anything.  So far, so good!!

 Glad that it was warm enough outside to cut, paint and glue the wood without any trouble.

 I found paint pens at Wal-mart that made painting the faces very easy.

The directions called for the face piece to be up and down (like the two in the back), but I tried the last one with the face sideways and decided that I liked it better.  There was another piece of lumber hanging around that was much larger and I asked Bob if he could cut the wood the same way to make a larger snowman....and he was successful.  It ended up being very, very heavy so I decided to keep it since it was going to be difficult to give as a gift.  Bob figured out that there were enough scraps from the first 3 snowmen to make one more, so I ended up making 5 snowmen total.

If you are interested in the blog posting with pattern for these snowmen:
http://www.soyouthinkyourecrafty.com/2011/12/4x4-no-melt-snowman-tutorial-guest-post/

The next craft that I worked on was not from Pinterest, but a gift that Grandma Carolyn has been receiving from us for a few years.  Kaitlin said that she wanted one too the last time she was visiting so this year I made two.

A scrapbook calendar from a kit that I get every year at Michael's.

 Everything you need to make the calendar is in the kit, except for your pictures and adhesive.  I have found that adhesive squares (or glue dots) and tacky glue make this process much easier.

 There are step by step directions for each page.

Here are some of the finished pages...

Next on my crafting agenda...wreathes.  I saw a few on Pinterest that I liked that you could purchase for $150.00+.  What????!!!!  $150, $176 for wreathes!!  Here are the two that I made for around $30...

I also made some Christmas tree ornaments featuring pictures of my favorite subject...Bobby...but for some reason I can't find the pictures of them on my computer.  Humm, wonder where they went??!!

Speaking of Bobby, I made get into the action of making homemade Christmas presents!!!  My favorite gifts that we gave this holiday by far were a Pinterest craft.  I never imagined how well that Mr. Bobby would do with his craft!!  He sat down and worked like a champ after I got everything ready...

 He sat down and completed 3 perfect snowflake canvases!!!

 Without any direction, he swirled the paint around and kept putting the side of the brush down onto the canvas giving the picture texture.

 The finished product...

I know that I am biased, but this is super cute!!!!!  I'm still amazed at what a great job he did!!!  Here is the Pinterest blog where I got this cute idea...
http://tenkidsandadog.blogspot.com/2010/01/preschool-snowflake-masterpiece.html

I also had Bobby help with one part of his teacher and therapists gifts...

Honestly, I didn't really even give him directions, he figured it out for himself.

He even stuffed the tree tops!

He then put the tree top on.  What a great job big guy!!!

Finally, my last homemade Christmas gift.  It wasn't a Pinterest idea.  Instead I decided to repurpose Bobby's table and chairs that he has outgrown and made it girl friendly for my nieces...

 
Here is Bobby's chair when it was boy friendly, but that just won't do for two little girls!!

Much better for girls.  Now the finished product...

Now the horrible part of this table and chair gift...it is still in my garage.  My family needs to stay well so that I can get this delivered!!  Oh, what a sick winter this has been in Bobby's World.

I really enjoyed making all of these gifts, but next time I need to start much earlier, so that it doesn't end up being a big 'ol chore the closer it gets to Christmas.  After all, there is baking, wrapping, programs...........all going on at the same time!!  Now, I need to find a spring craft to do.  Wonder if my family will be as involved??