Happy Little Bits of #Whitespace Christmas

Beautiful in His Time is a participant in multiple affiliate marketing programs. The author of this blog may receive commission for purchases or clicks made through links on this website.

Having a whitespace (less stressed) Christmas sounded really good on a blog post, didn’t it?

Ha-ha-ha.

In reality, I’ve been very very busy. However, not too stressed, so, there’s that.

I have said no to a lot of things: like decorating (beyond the Christmas tree and stockings) and baking (although there is a gluten-free cookie mix in the pantry calling my name).

We have read a Christmas book almost every night, but I didn’t bother wrapping them. Ezra hasn’t noticed.

Tomorrow, I’m hosting a mini-Christmas party for some of my mommy friends from church. My house isn’t ready. They will have to deal with it.

I’m working (slowly) on fixing my blog’s images. It turns out that transferring from WordPress.com to WordPress.org is a breeze – except for the media library, especially when your media library has over 3500 pictures. So y’all will have to deal with the broken images in the archives for a while. I’m not going to stress out about it. One post at a time. (And seriously, we are never ever ever doing another blog transfer. Ever. Because going through post by post to fix images two years in a row is just not my idea of fun. At all.)

Other than that, there’s been unhealthy levels of Christmas music. Pandora at home and WMAG in the car – ad nauseum. Ezra now knows all the lyrics to Last Christmas I Gave You My Heart and I can only hang my head and take responsibility. He’s also learned how to do the cute responses to Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer (like a lightbulb!) and can frequently be heard singing “Ho-ho the mistletoe…Santa Claus is coming to town!” He also gets VERY excited about Silent Night and What Child is This. And Walking in a Winter Wonderland. And Jingle Bells. You get the picture.

I also spent about two weeks binging on every awful cheesy b-list Christmas movie that Netflix has to offer. (Well, not every. I still have about twenty more in my queue to watch between now and Christmas.)

There’s been shopping, shopping, and more shopping. Which I never plan to do but ends up happening anyway. Russ and I bought each other flannel sheets and a Waterpik flosser for Christmas. You can tell we have been married for a while.

My brother came into town for Thanksgiving. We hadn’t seen him in two years, but him visiting over Thanksgiving has become sort of a tradition, given he visited in 2010, 2011, and 2012. He helped us decorate our Christmas tree, which Ezra enjoyed immensely.

Now that Ezra is starting to get to a better place behaviorally, I’ve attempted some at-home preschool crafts and activities for us to do. He goes through activities like some kids go through candy, which is a good thing. His attention, focus, and ability to sustain an activity without fussing has definitely increased. Sometimes things still frustrate him, but he’s been able to play with playdough, fingerpaint, and even (gasp!) a sensory bin for as long as 20 or 30 minutes, which is honestly astounding!

Ezra is enthralled with Christmas jammies and socks. Two days in a row when he got to therapy he took his shoes off immediately to show his teachers.

He thinks that this top, that says “Baaa-la-la-la-la,” is hysterical.

Someone gave us net Christmas lights, which are honestly a beautiful creation. I spread them over the bushes in about as much time as it takes me to make the bed (when I make it). It took me twice as long to drag the extension cord around the corner of the house to plug them in. Ezra was thrilled at the results.

Before Thanksgiving, I found Santa Cow at ChickFilA and couldn’t say no to buying it for Ezra. Now we have added Santa Cow to the collection of Birthday Cow and Beach Cow.

Also, this is Batman, not Ezra. He would want you to know that.

The most extensive project I have delved into this holiday season has been gifts for all of Ezra’s therapists and providers. They have been SO amazing to our family, words just can’t even explain how grateful I am for them. If I’m going to give up my ideals of a whitespace Christmas, it’s going to be for the people who continue to pour into our lives and help our son. So, for a good portion of one day this week, my kitchen table looked like this:

And, instead of paying a lot of money for a drive-through light display, we drove through a couple of nice neighborhoods instead. I loved teaching Ezra how to say a favorite childhood phrase, “They go BIG on Christmas lights!”

And I just have to share this picture we took of Ezra in November. Here he is being the Incredible Hulk in the leaves. You better believe this went on a Christmas ornament this year!