A walk through our Christmas!

We have been blessed to have a beautiful Christmas, family that loves and cares for us, and happy, healthy children. Let me take you on a journey through our Christmas!(Remember to click the picture to enlarge it if you need to!)

It is a Christmas Eve tradition to open jammies! I don't know if this started before my parents time or not - but while I was growing up we always got new jammies on Christmas eve (so that we'd look nice for pictures the next day) and it has continued in my family. This year we voted to do cinnamon rolls for S.C. rather than cookies. It was a nice change - S.C. told us so in his yearly letter!

The kids were up at 6am but we sent them back to bed. Then at 7 they were in our room again and this time we told them that when L wakes up that we'd get up. So they came in at 7:15, 7:30, 7:45 and finally at 8am they succeeded at getting us out of bed! We did stockings first and then made homemade cinnamon rolls to get the morning started! Here are a few of the favorites from THE MAN!!

With so many people that loves these rug rats it was hard for them to pick just one or two favorites so instead I'll do a collage of each child! K loved her Christmas. One thing that I loved about K today was the fact that she gave homemade gifts to everyone. She gave some of her favorite things away to her siblings and she decorated ornaments for her aunts and uncles. She's very creative and those homemade gifts meant more to her brothers and sister than the store bought ones did!

M is always fun- Christmas or not! When the kids got in bed last night we told them not to open any S.C. gifts until we got up. But low and behold when we arose there were several gifts opened already. The reason "M made us do it - she told us to just peek, and we did" (sounds like Satan and Eve a little!) Some of M's favorite gifts are pictured here. But really - she couldn't choose just one!

N was a little hard to shop for this year. We looked high and low to find what might delight him and I think that what we found was just perfect. One of N's favorite gifts was a CD player/radio. He had it plugged in almost immediately! N received a folder from K that was full of her Pokemon cards. These cards meant a lot to K - she worked hard to collect and purchase them on her own. When he opened that folder he smiled, closed it, got up and went and gave K the biggest hug. It melted my heart! HOW SWEET!

I'll have you know that it was hard to get any pics of L doing anything other than pushing his new truck around or riding on his little fire truck. In fact, even at this time (and L is already in bed) he still has 4 presents left to open. He just wanted to open one and play for an hour before he was ready to move on. We didn't push him to get it all done - he's little - he's got time - he loves everything anyway!! It was fun to watch him open things. Little bits of paper here and there. Licking all that he got - guess that's the way to tell if it's good or not!

Christmas is a beautiful time of year for parents and children alike! It's very difficult to surprise me (always has been) so the hubby (and parents) try hard to get me all confused. They didn't confuse me this year - but there were a few tiny surprises and I LOVED THEM!! Pictured above you see me opening a big red gift.

A few years ago my father bought this Kinkade for me and I couldn't afford to get it framed. My mom took it over a year ago and has been holding on to it. Look what she did for me!! (that's her on the phone - she called to "hear me open it"). Then my dad gave me a box with 2 things inside. I was guessing on what each was when Tim snapped the pic! One was a movie - the other SwiMp3 player. GREAT - that will help with my New Year's resolution to get back to the pool!!

Tim had a beautiful Christmas as well. His present came at the start of December so he didn't have much to open today. The kids got a new Wii game - YEAH and we topped off our day with a lovely, quiet dinner at home.

So there you have it - a walk through our day! Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!