Yule interludes

1

The first Christmas they were all together was two weeks after Grace was born.

Henry saw Regina's head droop forward as she fed the baby. "Feeling tired, mom?"

"A bit." Regina looked up sleepily at her oldest child.

"I can hold her a bit while you get some rest" Robin said gently.

"Uh huh." Regina nodded. Rebecka had warned her about the exhaustion the first two or three weeks. Regina was glad now she'd let Snow and Robin convince her to take maternity leave. She handed off the baby to Robin and slowly got to her feet.

An excited Hope quickly crawled over to her feet "Maa!" She reached up.

Regina smiled tiredly down at her.

Roland swooped in behind Hope and quickly lifted her up. Hope squealed with excitement and flailed her arms around, she liked this game!

"Thank you Roland" Regina bent down and kissed both children's foreheads. Roland grinned at her and Hope patted her cheek.

Henry followed his mom upstairs "Getting a DVD" he said. But really he was making sure she could make it up the stairs.

Regina gave him a knowing look but let him follow. Once she was sitting on the bed she smiled. "I'm fine now. Go on back down and have fun. I'll be back down in a bit."

"Okay mom."

"She resting?" Robin asked when Henry returned to the living room

"Yeah. At least this time she gave in before you had to carry her." Henry gave Robin a rueful smile.

"She'll be fine soon."

Henry nodded. "It does make our surprise easier to set up."

"Indeed."

Regina lamented that her exhaustion made going into a photo studio for their new family portrait too much of an ordeal. She had wanted one as soon as she and Grace came home. But her post-partum exhaustion made it impossible.

Robin pulled a large box down from the top shelf in the closet. White button down shirts and black pants for the boys and himself. Dark green velvet jackets for Roland and himself, while Henry's was dark blue. The girls and Regina had red velvet dresses. The boys dressed themselves while Robin dressed the girls and himself. Luckily both girls were ready for a nap, so after dressing them he laid Grace in the living room bassinet and let Hope sleep on the couch beside him. He and the boys watched a Christmas DVD while they waited for Regina to wake up.

"Awful quiet down here" Regina announced as she reached the bottom stair.

Roland giggled from the living room

"Just what have you been scheming up?" Regina smirked as she walked in, then gasped at the sight of them all dressed up.

Robin grinned and pointed to the chair.

Regina saw a red velvet dress, matching the girls, was laid across a chair.

"Oh." Her eyes teared up. She quickly wiped them away with her hand, embarrassed.

"You were sad that you were too tired to get an official studio portrait of the family before Christmas, so we decided we could do it here, mom." Henry pointed to his DSLR camera set up on a tripod.

She gave him a hug and pulled Roland into it as well. "Thank you." She looked warmly at Robin who was now lightly bouncing Hope on his knee, much to her delight. Hope had awakened when Regina had spoken and had crawled onto her father's lap. Grace though, slept on in her bassinet. She'd likely sleep on even through the photo taking, especially as Henry had set it so it wouldn't flash.

Regina let go of the boys and picked up the dress. With a quick smile back at them, she ducked into the smaller downstairs bathroom to change.

In a few moments she emerged. A little magic to eliminate the dark circles under her eyes and the wrinkles from everyone's clothes and they were ready. Regina held Grace while Robin held Hope. Regina and Robin stood next to each other and Roland on the other side of Robin. Henry ran back after he hit the timer and stood on Regina's other side.

After a few serious pictures, Roland begged to do some silly ones. Regina complied for one, but then let Robin and the boys, plus Hope continue with the fun while she laid the still sleeping Grace back in the bassinet and sat on the couch watching their antics. Hope soon bored of the silliness and Robin let her down on the floor. Hope quickly climbed onto Regina's lap, giggling whenever her mama laughed. Before long Robin joined them. Regina cuddled up to Robin and they watched as the boys continued to indulge in silliness in front of the camera, which was now on video mode.

Regina had never felt such simple joy in her life, this truly was the happiest she'd ever been.

2

Emma winced at the din as she stepped inside Regina's house with Killian

"Aye. As loud as pirates on shore leave."

"But better language."

"How can you tell?"

Emma laughed.

Snow spotted them and waved them toward the kitchen

"Just lay it there with the rest of the food" Regina pointed toward the breakfast table, which was currently serving as the drop off place for the dishes everyone brought. The meal would come later, although most the children running around had already availed themselves of anything that didn't require a knife, fork or spoon. As had most the adults present. Even Regina held a celery stick in her hand as she directed things from becoming general chaos.

Robin was stirring a meat stew while he kept an eye on Regina's lasagna cooling next to the stove. Regina came over and they exchanged a quick kiss as she used kitchen gloves and picked up the lasagna. Tinkerbelle was making a salad with Maleficent. Maleficent tolerated the din of Regina's extended family on this day with some alcohol fortification. She liked the children, but some of the adults cut close to her toleration limit. Tinkerbelle adored all the children, but Regina's especially.

What had been a little family surprise for Regina three years ago now had become an extended family tradition on Christmas Eve. Everyone came over for a set of family pictures and dinner. This year there was another addition to the extended family. Wilfred and Rowena married two years ago, and this February they had a boy. They named him Cedric after Wilfred's father.

In the living room Hope and Grace were holding Cedric's hands as he took awkward baby steps. Little Neal was watching as Roland, Roberta and Matthew laid out the train set around the Christmas tree, under Henry's and Violet's supervision. Belle was reading "The Night Before Christmas" to her daughter Bae. Snow was waiting by the door for Belle's father to arrive. Moe French was almost always the last to arrive. David and Wilfred were somewhat reluctantly listening to Hank talk about local politics. As soon as Emma saw Hank Morgan was holding forth, yet again, she quickly pulled Killian back into the kitchen with her.

Regina smirked at their quick return. Hank Morgan never had warmed to Emma and Killian and was best avoided by them. Regina did understand why. At least he'd gotten to the point where he lectured them rather than outright mistrusted them though. Hank still had a rather Victorian moral code and judged people by it. Felt it was his duty to lecture them on proper behavior. Regina and Robin, the Charmings, and Rowena and Wilfred since they had Cedric fit within Hank's definition of acting with proper behavior, and he also was quite sympathetic to Belle. "If there was ever a good case for divorce, her unfortunate circumstances prove it." Hank had remarked more than once. As Hank was Violet's father and she and Henry were dating, Hank had been invited any time Violet was, they'd gotten used to him.

Hank and Moe French got along quite well, which was why, besides Belle's reconciliation with her father, he was invited. That being said, Moe actually seemed quite touched the first time he was invited, last year. He wasn't any kind of cook "You wouldn't want to eat what I could try to make", but the florist brought over plenty of flowers and plants, both as his contribution to the party and as gifts. Regina guessed he'd do the same this year so, besides the tree and door wreath she'd left out any other plant or flower decorations.

Sure enough, five minutes later the doorbell rang and they helped Moe bring in all the decorations he'd packed in his truck. Regina used a little magic to quickly get it all in place. Soon Moe and Hank were in their favorite corner talking, while everyone else breathed a sigh of relief.

The tradition for this holiday party had started when Snow had seen the family pictures almost three years ago. Regina had finally felt up to getting out with the family right after New Years. Snow invited them over to their place. When Henry showed her the pictures, Snow had promptly said they should have a family party next year. When Snow got an idea like that, it would happen; everyone knew not to even bother arguing. So the next Christmas it was Snow, David, Neal, Violet and her father Hank. Emma and Killian turned down the invitation when they heard Hank Morgan would be there. Snow and David brokered some kind of détente between the sides and both grudgingly showed up the next year.

Tinkerbelle had been quite enthusiastic about the family party and she got Maleficent to tolerate the more annoying adults for the day. Regina made sure she had a glass of wine ready for her and seated them with the children for the dinner.

The girls and the formerly timid Roberta seemed to be quite taken with Maleficent. Regina was certain Roberta's personality change was Maleficent's influence. It was probably a good thing as when Rebecka had recently tested her again she was now showing a future potential for a moderate level of air element magic with soft but bright yellow citrine glow for her color. "She's the strongest full air element of the children. She'll eventually need a teacher with her element to help her, especially as neither of her parents have magic, nor her siblings. Her cousin Roland has a similar level and already slightly active, but he's earth element as is Robin's low level magic."

"And I'm fire element."

"Your friend Maleficent is air along with fire, and your children's godmother is air along with earth. Both are high level magic users."

"Yes, and thankfully they both like children and the children like them."

Regina spoke to Rowena and Wilfred about this plan.

"They stayed and protected the children and me, while you went to bring Wilfred back. Of course I trust them with Roberta's training. I wouldn't know the first thing about it."

As for the other children Bae had a potential for low to moderate level magic but it was so undeveloped there wasn't a hint of an element yet. Little Neal was even more of a mystery, there was only the most minimal spark of potential low level magic, something had damaged his magic potential.

Snow had looked dismayed "Damaged? Will it hurt him? How?"

Regina growled "I know how. Zelena. My sister's spell used up almost all his magic potential."

"Your sister used a spell that drained a baby's energy?"

"Yes. Plus my soul heart, a symbolic image of Gold's brain and David's courage. Time travel spell. We stopped it fairly quickly, think it just drained some of my dark energy, but apparently Neal took the biggest hit, he was the person with magic that had no protection…"

"He'll be okay. It didn't hurt him in a real physical way. And now Now that I know how, and he's still quite young, I think I can repair the damage. He will be lower level than he would have been, but he should show an element eventually. That is if you want him to have access to magic?" Rebecka said.

"It won't hurt him if he doesn't?" David asked.

"No, but-"

"David, we shouldn't deprive him, it's a part of him." Snow looked resolute.

"Okay Snow, we'll do it." David nodded.

"Thank you, it might have caused him to resent your choice later on if you had said no. He might have felt you didn't trust him." Rebecka replied.

"Yes. And I guarantee he would have." Regina said. This way, since it would likely just be low level he wouldn't really have to be trained but he could choose to if he wanted.

But all that was in the future. Regina let Roland pull her over to the tree and everyone crowded in close for the family picture. Henry set the timer and jumped in next to Violet. This year, as last, with so many families within the big family, they then did smaller family pictures, before the older children took over and pulled out their phones and made silly short videos.

Roland was especially excited; he had his first "grown up" phone this Christmas. Regina and Robin gave it to him early so he could take videos "just like Henry" now. Henry grinned over at them as he and Violet stepped out for a walk. He wasn't a kid anymore, videos were fun for a bit, but he'd rather spend time with Violet alone.

Regina watched them go out the door, wistfully. Her little prince was all grown up now.

"We aren't so old, yet, my love." Robin whispered in her ear "Say, let's take our own walk. It's early yet. We've a half hour before supper, and the girls are having fun playing as is Roland. Now's our chance to slip out the back." Robin chuckled softly.

Regina's eyes danced with excitement. "I think I'll take you up on that." They quickly ducked out the back and Regina poofed them to the lake. "We'll walk here. Not far from the vault if you'd like a different kind of walking" Regina smirked.

"Oh yes, indeed, milady." Robin laughed.