A/N: The Roberts are joining the Rabb's in this chapter.

Sleigh Bells Ring

It's been another busy morning at JAG. It seems that everyone wants to pack in as much as they can before the holidays. Harm has been on the phone for the last several minutes talking with the executive assistant for Admiral Klein. He glances up and sees Bud lingering outside of his office, so he waves his hand gesturing for him to come in and sit down as Harm tells his caller, "Understood, Captain. I'll make sure that the General is aware of the changes. We'll see you at noon." He hangs up the phone and inquires, "What's up, Bud?"

Bud wrings his hands together, "I'm sorry for interrupting, Sir. Harriet just called and reminded me that we were getting together tonight at your house to get the stuff ready for the kids' school Christmas party. She just wanted me to check with you and the Colonel to make sure that 1800 was still good."

Harm's eyes go wide, "That's tonight?! I'm sorry, Bud, I totally forgot. I guess I will have to rearrange my twelve days of Christmas plan with the kids just a little, but it will be fine." He glances over at his Outlook calendar which shows not only his own schedule, but Mac's as well. After verifying that it won't impact anything currently showing on her calendar, he answers, "I think we can still manage to swing it, but I will have to have to ask the General if I can secure a little early. I need to pick up a few things at the store first."

Bud chuckles, "Harriet thought you might, Sir. She offered to take care of the shopping and she will bring everything to your house tonight. She said to e-mail her the list of what you need and you can reimburse her later."

Harm stands up, "Thanks Bud. I'll send it to her in just a little bit. Right now, I need to send a note to Mac's yeoman to remind her as well and I need to see the General. They just sent a major revision of the briefing we are attending at noon, and I need to see if this will change our talking points once he reviews it."

Buds nods, "Aye, Aye, Sir. I'll let her know to expect it soon."

Harm briskly walks over to the General's office and finds the door open. He beckons, "Come on in, Harm, and close the hatch. I just saw the revisions come through."

Harm and General Cresswell spend the next half hour going over the changes and how it will affect their responses. It leaves Harm about ten minutes to ensure that his wife is good with tonight's plans and to send Harriet a requirements list before he has to meet the General at the car. He finds a red sticky note on his desk that reads, "Harriet called me. She is not only doing the shopping, she also offered to pick up the kids. We will see you at home later and are excited for what you have planned! I love you, Sailor!"

He smiles widely, thinking to himself that he really did marry the best woman in the world! He will need to make a stop by the florist on the way home to pick up flowers for both his lovely wife and the gracious Mrs. Roberts to thank her for carrying some of the load today. He quickly shoots off an e-mail with the massive list of required ingredients and a few snapshots of the finished products for what he has planned before grabbing his cover and racing down to the parking lot.

A few hours later, Harm and Cresswell have finished both the briefing at the Pentagon, and all the action items from that meeting. Harm rubs his eyes as he realizes he has almost as much work to still do tonight at home.

As he is walking down to his car, his phone dings to remind him to stop by and see Maribell. She always has whatever he needs, and usually a few things he didn't know he needed. Pulling up to his favorite florist, he walks in and orders a dozen red roses for Mac and a half dozen yellow ones for Harriet. On a whim, he picks up a single white one for Trisha as well.

He enters his house and immediately hears woman laughing and children giggling. It is complete music to his ears. He never would have figured that he would adapt to a domestic lifestyle, but he honestly wouldn't trade all the years with his family for the fastest jet in the world. Absolutely nothing can match the euphoria he feels when he is with Mac and his kids. Keeter was right, married life has turned him into a sentimental sap. Soon, his parents and his grandmother will arrive and Christmas will be in full swing with the entire Rabb/Burnett family under one roof.

He carefully hangs up his coat and cover and walks past the dining room finding the table covered in bags of candy and ribbon and into the kitchen where the sounds were emanating from. He finds Harriet and Mac chopping various vegetables on the island while Bud is helping the children curl ribbon at the table. He extends the smaller vase to Mrs. Roberts with a kiss on her cheek, "Thank you for all your assistance today."

Harriet blushes as she accepts his gift, "I didn't do anything special. But thank you for the flowers, they are beautiful."

Harm holds his index finger up to his wife, indicating he will be with her in a moment as he takes the single white rose over to his daughter, "For you, sweetheart."

Trisha sits there slack-jawed for a moment before jumping off her chair and wrapping her arms around his waist giving him a huge hug, "Thank you, Daddy! Can you keep it with Mommy's for now so it doesn't wilt?"

He hugs her back one-handed, and places her flower back in the vase with mac's, "You are quite welcome, honey."

He walks back over to his wife, who arches her brow at the large vase in his hand, "What's the occasion, Sailor?"

Harm leans in to give her a kiss, "Someone left this nice note on my desk today and I thought I should let her know how much I love her too."

Mac places the vase on the island and wraps her arms around his neck, deepening his kiss. When their lips part, she breathlessly whispers, "Message received."

Harm rolls up his sleeves asking the two women, "Where do you want me?"

Mac grins as she automatically answers, "Anywhere and Everywhere!"

Harm's cheeks redden, "Maacc!" as Harriet lowly chuckles at Mac's response.

Not repentant in the least, Mac laughs, "I'm just speaking the truth here."

Harm leans over, sets the knife in her hand on the counter, and nibbles lightly on her ear before whispering huskily into it, "Do you really want to have this battle in front of our guests and the children?"

Harm's gentle ministrations send shivers down to her toes. Gulping audibly she mumbles, "Duly noted. I'll behave, for now." A little louder she announces, "We are almost done with the veggies, so why don't you get started on the dip and then you and the kids can arrange the platter. By the time you are finished, the lasagna that's baking should be about done so we can eat and work on the sleighs afterwards. That way the kids won't spoil their dinner because you know they are going to want to eat some of the components."

Harm heads to the fridge to pull out the ingredients for his famous home-made ranch dip. He grabs six white bowls, all different sizes from one of the cupboards and pulls both the large green rectangle platter and the red one as well off the top of the fridge. When he has finished stirring up his special sauce, he places that bowl near the top of the platters and walks over to the kids, "Who wants to help Daddy make a snowman?"

The kids all jump up and run to look out the window. AJ complains, "Uncle Harm, it isn't snowing!"

Harm smiles, "No it isn't, but we are going to make a snowman right here." He turns to Harriet, "Maestro, please."

Harriet puts on the Frozen soundtrack for a little musical inspiration while they work.

Placing the platter on the table he illustrates, "This bowl with the dip will be at the top and we will need to give him eyes, a nose, and a mouth." He grabs the medium sized bowl of button mushrooms explaining, "This will be his middle section." The last bowl he grabs is the largest and full of cauliflower. "This will be his base."

Matthew tilts his head sideways trying to see exactly what his father means and isn't quite seeing the big picture just yet. Harm notices his intent scrutiny and calls out, "Mac, can you bring me a packet of the sliced olives, the bowl of halved olives, and all the carrots."

Mac brings the requested items to him, and then puts the rest of the veggies on plates for him to add the rest to the platter as needed.

Harm opens the package of olives and places two of them towards the top of the dip to give the snowman some eyes. He asks, "Who wants to give him a nose."

Jimmy shouts, "Me!"

Harm hands him one of the slivers of carrot instructing, "Lay it sideways just below the eyes."

Jimmy scrunches up his nose trying to make sure he has it at just the right angle before laying it down.

Harm tousles his hair when he is finished and asks the group, "Who is going to give him a mouth?"

AJ jumps in, "I will!"

Harm places three medium pitted olives that have been sliced in half in AJ's hand. He states, "That should be enough, but if you want more, I have plenty."

AJ places them under the nose, "I think that looks good. Nah, let me have two more." The rest of the children nod their agreement.

Harm grabs two celery stalks and adds them at a forty-five degree angle branching out from the second bowl to give their little man arms. He hands three more olives to his son and asks, "Do you want to give him buttons?"

Matthew nods as Harm points to the mushroom bowl and tells him, "Put them there in a line, one right under the other."

Matthew places them just as his dad asks, and announces, "It's Frosty!"

Harm chuckles, "Not quite, but he is a pretty good-looking snowman! I think he needs a hat though!" Turning to his daughter, he asks, "Trisha why don't you take a handful of the olives and give him a proper hat."

Harm adds a bunch of grape tomatoes above the snowman's arms surrounding the top bowl, and places a bunch of baby carrots just below the arms going all around the second bowl. He motions to Trisha and AJ and asks them to place the sugar snap peas along the edges of the bottom bowl. When they are finished, Trisha exclaims, "That's pretty cool, Dad! I really think my class will like it."

Harm smiles and then sees that he has a ton of unused vegetables. He asks, "Good. Now that we have completed this one and you guys know how to do it, do you want to make another one for AJ's class?"

The kids all nod their heads enthusiastically. Harm stands up, "I'll go make another dish of dip. You guys can get started on the rest with Uncle Bud's help." As everyone else is working on the snowmen, Harriet and Mac make sure the stuff is cleared off the dining room table and then they set it for family dinner.

They finish making the other snowman platter just as the oven timer dings signaling that the lasagna is ready. Harm raises his brow at her, and Mac laughs, "Precision timing, Sailor!" While Mac pulls the double dishes out and hands them to Harriet, Harm heads over where the kids are and secures both platters with cling wrap and places them in the fridge, ready to go for tomorrow.

Everyone is having a great time sampling the garlic bread, salad, and veggie or meat lovers' lasagna that was prepared for dinner. It's been quite a while since the Rabb's and the Roberts' have had a family dinner together. Conversation is continuous, and everything is moving at a leisurely pace until AJ notices all the bags stuffed into the corner. Pointing to them, he asks, "What are all those?"

Harriet groans, of course it would be her son who had to ruin the surprise planned for after dinner. Shaking her head in disbelief she remarks, "Those are for building the sleighs for all of your classmates. That's why you were curling ribbon earlier. However, we aren't building them until dinner is over and all the dishes are washed." Of course, that statement was all it took to have the kids scrambling to finish eating so that they could get to building sleighs.

When dinner is finished, Harm announces in a rather stern tone, "All the boys will follow me to the kitchen to wash dishes so that the ladies can set everything up out here. Anyone caught peeking will not be allowed to participate."

The females start unloading the bags filled with several boxes and bags of candy, separating everything out on the table in the order the sleighs will need to be built in. At the end of the table lie rolls of ribbon, multicolored bows, and the curled ribbons that the children made earlier. Just as Mac hears Harm draining the sink, she calls out, "Okay boys, we are ready for you. Come in and sit down and Harriet and I will show you how to build the sleighs. And no one is eating any of the items until we are done!"

When the men enter the dining room, Matthew's eyes light up like a Christmas tree, Jimmy's jaw is pretty much on the floor, and AJ shouts, "Holy Land of Candy!"

Mac grabs a bucket full of supplies and heads to one end of the table and Harriet sits on the other showing the kids how to make a sleigh using two candy canes, a full-size Kit Kat™ bar on the bottom, two Ghiradelli™ chocolate squares on top of that, three Hershey's™ miniature bars next, and one Andes™ mint on top. There are various flavors of almost all of the candy types to mix and match as the children choose. They also have double sided tape to keep each of the layers together, which is a lot safer than using a glue gun. When each sleigh is finished, the kids are supposed to hand their creation to one of the adults so that they can tie the ribbons around the candy to keep it secure, add a little jingle bell, and affix the curled ribbon and a bow on top.

By the time they are finished, they have completed one hundred and twenty-six sleighs, enough for each classmate of Jimmy, Matthew, AJ, and Trisha. The only real issue they encountered was when AJ decided that Santa's sleigh should be overloaded with about eight layers of candy instead of four to give to a girl he liked in his class. Bud chuckled, "Times have definitely changed. When I was his age, we pulled on a girl's pigtails to let her know we liked her. But I suppose his way works as well."

He hears Harriet mutter, "Son of a lawyer! Always looking for the most complex way to do something simple." Harm and Mac both chuckle in remembrance of a similar conversation on a porch all those years ago.

The children are each allowed to eat one piece of large candy or two smaller pieces as the adults pack up the extra supplies. Harm takes the bag out to the garage to hide it away from hungry children and comes back with a shit eating grin on his face. He wraps his arms around his wife from behind, "I love you, Mac."

Mac groans as Harriet inquires "What's that all about?"

Mac sighs as she whispers, "I'm pretty sure that Harm just found one of his Christmas presents under the tarp for the ride on lawn mower."