Our Christmas

This Christmas was spread over two days, which was actually a nice way to do it.  Because my sister Nicki and her family travel to Hobart on Christmas Day, we decided it would be better to have our big family Christmas on Christmas Eve so we could relax and not have to rush. 

On Christmas Eve morning we went to visit Aaron's Dad and Step Mum, Carrol to exchange presents.  I gave Aaron's Dad a couple of special photos in frames of Aaron. One was when he was dressed up as the Hawthorn mascot, Hawka (unfortunately I'm not allowed to share any pics of Aaron in the suit with the Hawka head off because that's what you agree to when you are the mascot) and one was of Aaron's Dad, sister Trudy and Aaron together which was taken about 7 years ago.  His Dad was very teary and said that he loved them.

We had a great Christmas surprise up our sleeve as my brother Christian wasn't going to come down for Christmas.  A few weeks ago I was talking to him on the phone and convinced him to try to get an extra day off work, so he could fly down for Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and Boxing Day. Luckily his boss agreed and said that he shouldn't be alone for Christmas, so he booked his tickets to come down.

We hadn't told any of the family and had a great time playing it up all week that he was going to be home on his own for Christmas.  I would write on his Facebook wall, saying how I wished he was coming home for Christmas and my Mum and siblings would jump in saying they wished he was coming too.  On the way out to see my family with him he posted an old pic of him 'working' on his wall and tagged all my family in it.  We were having a great laugh!

We drove out to my brother Eden's house for our family Christmas Eve dinner and loved surprising everyone!  Mum cracked me up when she yelled 'I was feeling sorry for you, you idiot!' and my brother Eden said he knew he was coming all along, but I doubt it :)


  The boys love having him home.  We wish he would just move down.

While the food cooked, we sat outside and enjoyed watching the (big) boys and kids play some sport and have fun with the guinea pigs.

We had a huge feast of chicken and pork with heaps of veggies and yummy desserts.

It's great that Eden and Steph's house is so big. 

After tea we exchanged presents.  We don't do adult presents anymore, but each child buys for one of their cousins and we have made it so we only spend $20 per present. It's actually nice and stress free as we try to search for that perfect little present that we know one of their cousins would like.

It was fun seeing what each cousin had bought for each other. 

My Mum and Dad also buy for each of the kids.  Lachie was so cute searching for his name on the presents.

It was a really nice day, but I felt sad all day as Aaron and Noah were the only ones who weren't there (photo taken using Chrish's remote).
I think seeing Aaron's Dad get teary in the morning, set me up for the day, as I then felt sad for most of the day.  On the way home it was so nice to see a rainbow.  I told the boys that it may have been Dad and Noah saying they hope we have a happy Christmas.

I had been dealing with Christmas a lot better this year,  but I was still trying to avoid it as much as I could, so we hadn't been to see any Christmas lights yet (and I got out of going to Carols by Candlelight because I just didn't let the boys know it was on, and told Jay that we wouldn't be going again this year), so on the way home on Christmas Eve we went and saw a few houses before heading home.   Kobe is always amazed when he hears carols about 'baby Jesus' or sees pictures of baby Jesus as he thinks that we are the only ones who believe in that at Christmas time.  When we went to this house he said 'they must go to church Mum, because they have baby Jesus!'.

Harri and Kobe were so excited when they got home to put out some food for Santa and his reindeer.  Harri told me he had to write a note, and I couldn't stop laughing when I read it.

They were all very excited when they went to bed, but I just felt so sad as I prepared for Santa to come. It was always such a lovely time with Aaron as we were excited to see the boy's faces in the morning when they saw what Santa and we had for them. When I went to bed I just kept thinking about how I couldn't wait for Christmas to be over.

On Christmas morning I woke up at 6.30 am  and was shocked that the boys hadn't woken yet.  Jalen was the first to come into my room about 5 minutes later, and then it didn't take long for Harri and Kobe to get up and run downstairs to see what Santa had brought.

At first I was looking forward to Christmas shopping, but once I got into town it would hit me how different things are now, and I would just feel really anxious about Christmas all over again.  I couldn't wait to get the shopping done so I could get back home where I can hide away from the world a little bit.

The boys were so excited to give me presents that they had bought with my Mum.  They had all picked them out themselves, and were excited to see what I thought of them.  They loved all their presents and all morning Jay kept thanking me for everything.  It was nice that he had appreciated it so much, as it was so hard to think of what to get them, then to do all the shopping on my own as it was something that Aaron and I always loved doing together.

I really wanted to wake up at our own house on Christmas morning this year, as last year was just too hard, but to soften it a little bit I invited the 'sister' missionaries from church over for breakfast.  We love them so much and knew it would be fun to have them for breakfast.  They are from the USA and South Africa, so we knew that they would probably be sad that they are away from home on Christmas too, so it was nice to have them around.   We bought them a few little presents including a book about Tasmania for them to take home with them when they finish their mission.

We got the idea to have a menu for breakfast from my friends Lisa, Simone and Kellie when they made me a special birthday breakfast last year, so Jalen made it up for me and laminated them and put them on the table for Christmas morning.   They were so excited about them, and said they were going to put them in their journals to take home with them.

After breakfast the boys showed them what they got for Christmas.

Sister Vermulen (from South Africa) had heaps of fun setting up jumps and tracks with Harri for Kobe's remote control car.  She only has sisters, so she said it was fun to play with some boy toys.

Jalen got a remote control helicopter from one of his cousins (maybe Kelsea?) and Sister Hadfield had lots of fun trying to get it to stay up.  It did fly quite well for a bit, until it flew across the street and into the neighbors yard.   Luckily we found it.

In the afternoon we headed back out to my brother Eden's house for a quieter Christmas Day tea. My brother Jared and his family had gone camping, and my sister Nicki and her family had gone to Hobart, so it was much smaller than our Christmas Eve together.  We headed to the beach first for some cricket, a kick of the footy, play some Frisbee and had a little dip in the water.

 Santa did well by giving the boys some water guns which they loved.

When we got back to Eden's house, he had the water slide going like last year. 

I love Kobe in this pic! 

We had a lovely easy tea on Christmas night - ham and prawns with salads.  I love Chloe's cute outfit which Steph made, which was one of her Christmas wishes. 

After tea we sat outside around the bonfire, and rode the four wheel motorbike around the paddock. 

It's hard to believe that it's already our third Christmas without Noah, and second one without Aaron.  I think the lead up to Christmas and Christmas Eve was a lot worse than the actual day.  It was nice to have an easier Christmas Day, and I think about how that may mean that next year will be even easier, but it also makes me sad because it means that I'm getting used to my new 'normal'.

I hate that it's feeling more and more normal to be on my own with the boys, but am grateful that it's also getting a little easier at the same time.   I just wish I didn't have to adjust to being on my own with the boys, at all. 

We stayed at my Mum and Dad's new house that night and on the way there we went to see an amazing house with Christmas lights.  It was a nice way to finish off a Christmas Day which was much easier than I thought it would be.

41

Today would've been Aaron's 41st birthday.   If he were here I would be having a great time rubbing it into him about what an old man he was.  But when your husband passes away at the age of 39 you realise how young he really was and still would be today if he were here.  It was nice reading messages on his Facebook wall all morning, especially from past students.  One in particular was really lovely as he was saying how Aaron used to teach him in grade 7 and now he has graduated from Uni and has his first job teaching at a local high school. I know so much that Aaron would be proud of him and all his other students, who are working hard and doing things that they love.

A month or so ago the boys and I were talking about what we should do for Aaron's birthday.  Last year it was a really hard day, but we loved spending time with our good friends who made is so much easier for us, so we knew we wanted to do that again.  We planned to have a BBQ tea with them again, but decided that just the four of us would go out for lunch.

We were excited when Hogs Breath Cafe just recently opened up in Launceston, as we had been for the first time when we were in Hobart for the two year anniversary of Noah passing away.  A few weeks ago I got a lovely message on Facebook from a stranger,  who works at Hogs Breath who offered us VIP/Frequent Diner cards which would give us a discount whenever we went.  It was so lovely of her to offer it to us and I told her that we had planned on going there for Aaron's birthday, so she told me she would make the booking for us.

When we arrived today, I told the guy at the front that we had a booking and he told me that he had to speak to one of the managers about something.  The manager then came over to us and showed us our seats, and told us that today the meal was on them.  He said they wanted us to have a lovely time and that they would cover the cost for everything, and to order whatever we wanted!  I was so shocked! I hardly knew what to say, except to keep thanking him and he said 'it's Christmas! Enjoy!'.

Obviously the lovely lady who offered us the VIP cards had arranged it for us and we were so touched that people, and such a big business could be so kind to us, even now.  It means so much to us that people care so much.  It really made our day and it made the boys feel really special to know that people were being so kind to them on such a hard day.  

We had a little laugh that we were drinking diet coke, as Aaron loved his Pepsi and said it probably wasn't the best drink to be having on his birthday :)

 

Thank you to Hogs Breath for making a hard day extra special for us.  It meant a lot to me and my boys. 

For tea we got together with the Triffitts and the Woodwards for a BBQ at Punchbowl Reserve.   We were so full from lunch that we hardly ate anything, but it was just nice to get together with such good friends. 

The kids had fun feeding the ducks and playing around in the creek. 

 After tea we had a kick of the footy together.

Thanks Simone for the photos that I pinched from your blog post :) 

You would never guess that Simone and Simon's kids are the boys second cousins with the difference in their looks :)

After a play we headed to the cemetery to release some balloons and to have some Pepsi at Aaron's grave like we did last year.

Simone makes us laugh as the first time she had tasted Pepsi was at Aaron's birthday last year.  This year she decided to go with the strong stuff and have straight Pepsi instead of Pepsi Max.   We loved teasing her about it.  I'm sure Aaron would've been laughing and loving it too.

I had forgotten how awful Aaron's grave looked at the same time last year, until I looked at my blog post from then.  It's so much nicer now with the grass, and it's nice that it's still fairly green because of all the rain we've been having.

 I feel very blessed to have such great friends who make me laugh even on sad days.  It wasn't as hard this year as it was last year, and it was nice to see the boys coping with it a lot better too.

We told the kids to get ready to release their balloons and Jonty said 'and then Aaron will come back!?' which made me smile.

 A Pepsi for Aaron.

 I'm not sure what is in Jonty's cup, but I'm sure he didn't drink it!

Kobe is into doing headstands at the moment, and was keeping us entertained with it.  He was sure Daddy would want to see it.

 Visiting Noah's grave.

 It was such a beautiful night and it's always a nice time to go the cemetery just as the sun is starting to go down.

What I thought would be a really hard day, turned out to be a lovely day, thanks to the kindness of strangers and beautiful friends.   I'm sure Aaron would've been smiling down today.  I just wish like Jonty that he could come back, and that we could grow older together.