make it a family affair.
This year my three little missies put up most of the lights on the outside of our house. I was sick last week (and so were Mike and Emmett) and the girls didn’t want to wait for the rest of us to get better.
They took matters into their own hands.
Usually though…the girls, Emmett, and Mike work on the lights together. Their favorite part is that they will most likely get to get up on the roof.
I try not to watch that little bit. That’s the part where I go in the house and tell them to call me when they’re done or else I start doing my mom-thing where I imagine that we will spend the rest of the day in the emergency room. I keep my mouth mostly closed and tell them how brave they are and to stay close to Dad.
This year since the lights were mostly done by children under the age of 10 we thought we should at least try figure out if we had replacement bulbs for the burnt out part of the light strand. We didn’t. The girls already knew that, they said.
So instead we mostly just messed around outside.
Grace did a dance. To music in her head.
Everyone took a turn on the ladder.
Miriam jumped to touch the lights.
Cocoa watched all the shennanigans.
Emma and Grace looked through ornaments on the sidewalk. Not sure why.
Emmett shook the ladder, just that teeny, tiny, little, big brother shake, every time one of his sisters got on the ladder.
He also climbed out his window and got on the roof. He didn’t want to miss that annual tradition…
My favorite part about our lights this year is that my 10 year old and 7 year old daughters felt confident and independent enough to just go out and make the lights happen. They worked hard. I wish I could have seen it happen.
I don’t know what they used to reach the roof’s edge. I’m not sure I want to have created in my mind the menagerie of furniture they used to make it tall enough for them to reach. Maybe they got the ladder…I’ve seen the towers they build with plans to get atop them to reach things, though.
Everything about the lights is not perfect.
And there are things I would not have done. (The garland around the pillar and the tiny little trees by the front door steps.)
I don’t want to change any of it, though. It makes me smile every time we drive up to the house and I pull in to the garage under the tunnel of lights that they put up without any help.
3 Comments
beautiful. and the ones with the dog…oh my.
Tomi, thank you! I was just looking at pictures of Cocoa when we first got her. I can’t believe how grown up she is! I’m going to have to post some. 🙂
I agree, beautiful. Looks like they had lots of fun.
Love, Mother