Christmas Day 2018

Happy Valentine's Day friends!  I made it my goal to get the Christmas Day post up on Valentine's Day and it is happening! This is actually post number 73 for the year!  I started trying to catch up on January 9th and this post seemed so very far away.  I am now less than two months behind!

Merry Christmas!!!!  

We had the huge surprise blessing of waking up with the smallest dusting of snow in the grass!  It was something white, and we were thankful!  The kids stayed in their rooms until 7:00.  I think staying up late the night before kept them sleeping.  As usual they each had four presents plus stockings to open from us and then some presents from special people as well.  It was a very special time opening presents with our little family of four.  I am so thankful for our quiet Christmas traditions. This year I felt like the kids really appreciated some/all of their gifts, esp M which can be tricky!  

The tree before the chaos.

The filled stocking!

M and T always open the stocking gifts first.

M: I can't believe you gave us candy canes!

M: Electric Toothbrush!!

T: Buttercup and I are ready to open the presents!

The cats were going crazy sniffing all of the packages.  

T: New shoes (and a church outfit) from Grammy Shirli!

M: Check out these cool shoes!

M: I love the LEGO set Curt and Deb!

T: I wanted to make it right away!!!

M: I don't need any presents, just this great cat!

M and T:  We didn't need to get the cats presents because they loved all the boxes and papers. 

So... M isn't usually very into the presents he gets, but this year he was very animated and somehow we got lots of pictures of him during gift opening.  T was happy too, but we don't have pictures of her.

M: Three 10 True Tales books!!!  I love my "read" gift!

T got three starter chapter books featuring kittens!

Buttercup:  I LOVE Christmas!!

I don't want this to be a bragging session about M's gift choices, but I need to tell a bit about his "wear" gift.  M LOVES Dude Perfect.  They are a group of young men who make videos of cool sports things.  I went to their website and got him an official shirt.  For a kid who pretty much lives on  hand me downs, getting a shirt like this was a special and shocking surprise!  I just can't choose which pictures to keep so I am sharing several.

M: I just couldn't believe it. 

M: A read Dude Perfect shirt!

M: I LOVE IT!

M: Best Day Ever!

M: Of course I had to put it right on!

M: I was even willing to get a pic with my mom. 

T got hair stuff for her "wear" gift.  They both got LEGO sets for their "want" gift.  They both got face masks and T got gloves for their "need" gift.

T made some gifts at school that she shared with us.  So sweet!

T: I love giving gifts!

I have to share this photo because I am pretty sure it will make you all laugh.  The lack of sleep caught up with me and I needed to yawn right as Brandon was taking the photo.

M: I am still happy about the shirt!

I love these two!

They love their Daddy too!

Good friends gave me a bountiful supply of paper towels!!!   The perfect gift for me!

In addition to the gifts I wrapped a box of Lucky Charms for Christmas morning breakfast.  It was on sale as I was shopping and the kids were very excited about the sugary treat and I was excited that I hadn't stayed up for hours making some fancy breakfast. 

While we were eating breakfast it really started to snow.  It was SO BEAUTIFUL!  The flakes were huge and it felt like we were in a Christmas snow globe!  I just wanted to sit and stare out the window and sip tea all day.

SO beautiful!

Impossible to really capture the feel in a photo. 

Brandon got this photo from somewhere online and it must have been taken about the same time.  Our town is so beautiful.

Christmas beauty. 

After breakfast I headed for a walk and the kids and Brandon spent a lot of the rest of the morning digging into their new gifts!

T: I was already working on my little LEGO set at breakfast!

T: I can mostly do it on my own, but I like someone to be close to help.

M: This FBI book is awesome!

T: I finished this whole LEGO set!

Sunshine:  I think these shoe laces must be for us! 

M: This new puzzle was pretty tricky, but I got it!

S and B: We had to take a little Christmas rest. 

Working hard!

New winter gear!

T: Of course I had to strike a pose. 

Christmas Day is always a tricky day.  I long for a day where I can just relax and enjoy the family.  In reality I am always packing and prepping for our MO trip on the 26th.  This year we added another dimension to the day as T really wanted to make her mermaid tale.  It was quite a large undertaking, but we did manage.  The kids also watched Santa Claus 2.

T: I was learning to sew. 

T: It isn't easy. 

I am ready to go out and help Daddy shovel!

I don't think there was too much to shovel and apparently T wanted to have an adventure.  Don't worry we live on a very low traffic street and Brandon was right there.

T:  I did some shoveling on the street and stopped to make a snow angel!

By the end of the day the mermaid tale was complete and we were pretty much packed for MO.  I might have gotten a bit overwhelmed and eaten a bunch of oatmeal cookies right out of the freezer while watching Monk, but maybe that wasn't me... it could have been a dream.  

I hope the Christmas Roadtrip to MO will post tomorrow. It is a major undertaking so I might have late night... but hopefully without oatmeal cookie binging.