How the Christmas (2012) Went

Well a much belated posting, but winter has been extraordinarily full, and not in a bad way.

We always both dread and look forward to holidays, mainly Christmas and birthdays, which can bring out the worst in our middle son, thanks to the Autism.

Sean has an issue with presents and opening them.  In early years, he just used to go off on his own Christmas morning, and showed no interest.  We got used to celebrating without him, although it does leave a hole of a certain notable size in a parents heart.....

Then there came a point when the packaging was of some interest.  He also realized that it drove his brother Skyler crazy to just let the items sit, perhaps with a corner of the wrapping paper undone.  He would get around to opening them, usually a few days later, when no one was around.  Skyler used to go bananas!

Over the last year or two, we had some mild successes.  Last year, I just didn't wrap ANYTHING, leaving it all under the tree Christmas Eve (late, late, after they were in bed) for them to find in the morning, with little signs indicating each of their piles.  Sean was intrigued with this, wanting to know if Santa had written the signs, and so on.  He seems to hang onto this Santa idea, but still says some things that make me wonder if he does know a little more than he is letting on.

Anyhow this year we were not quite as lucky.  All the kids were up, but Sean refused to put any pants on, and I really didn't want to take pictures of them with his you-know-what hanging out.  Too many pictures like that of past Christmasses when he was little, and well, he's just getting too old for it.

But he was having none of it, and ended up in the Man Cave bedroom (the one with the TV), refusing to come out.  So Skyler started to bring gifts to him, half ripping them open (by accident)  and that went over a bit better.  At least Sean got to see a few of his things.

Meanwhile, Evie and Skyler and I opened our gifts.  I can't remember where Bob was at this point.  I know that the early morning struggles with Sean really bothered him (we were all fighting colds/fever at this point), and he was probably out in the kitchen enjoying some solitude.

With a house like ours (cut up and lots of rooms), we have a choice of places to put our tree, and the Shiatsu clinic won out again.  So down came the table, and up went the tree.

Here are the kids opening gifts, Sky and Evie in one room, and Sky bringing gifts to Sean in another (and you'll notice the clothes haven't yet materialized on Sean...)

I have to say, we did have a reasonably successful afternoon out at my niece's place for the Nolting Xmas.  Sean seemed to have no problem there.

Sean is waay in the background. Now that I look at the picture, I see that he is looking at his iPod, on which he enjoys taking pictures and filming.  He loves to play back what he's taken pic/video of, over and over again (especially the parts where his sister might be crying or screaming).

But we persevere.

One other incident from that Xmas morning at our house....a few days previously, Skyler had rounded out Sean for taking a bag of Skittles that some girl had given Sky as part of a Xmas present.  Flash forward to Xmas morning and what do we all find in our stockings, but little newsprint and masking tape wrapped packages of....Skittles.  From Sean.  Hmm, talk about one way of making your big brother feel a bit...regretful.  But it is like Sean to not say a word about his intentions while his brother is beating the crap out of him.  (OK a little harsh, but it's never pretty when big brother gets angry at little one).

Back to Xmas Day.  We had a reasonably calm afternoon, then Bob spent ages putting together the turkey and all, which is what he likes to do.  But like I said, tempers were a little short those days, and what started out as a nice Christmas meal....

...turned into craziness right after this shot.  This was the "silly" shot, but somehow Sean's putting Skyler's face into the bowl got misinterpreted (I think; I still don't really know what happened) and all of a sudden the boys were mad at each other again, and Bob got all fired up too and suddenly it was just Evie and I at the table.  "Well, we might as well enjoy our meal, honey", I said, passing the potatoes.

Bob has since given up coffee and all alcohol, since either of those seems to turn him into a raving lunatic...