Christmas 2011

Christmas being on a Sunday presented a little challenge with how the day would go. Our church was at 9 and with the kids usually getting up at 7 we decided and told the kids they had to be dressed with hair combed and teeth brushed before we went downstairs to look at their Santa gifts, if he came that is. We told them they could only look in their stockings and play with their Santa gift before church. We hoped that this plan would get us to church on time and it worked. I woke up at 7:20 and nobody was up. I had to wash and blow dry my hair so I quickly took a shower and got ready thinking the whole time I've got to be fast because I don't want to miss out on any of the action. At 7:45, still everyone was asleep so I woke up Neil and told him to hop in the shower. While Neil was getting ready in popped the boys all dressed and ready to go. Too bad I had not laid out their clothes the night before so they didn't have their Christmas sweaters on but they quickly obeyed and changed their clothes with no complaints. I wish every day could be Christmas morning. I sure would have some obedient kids. We waited for Neil to get ready and then the kids were ready to go downstairs. Neil puts up baby gates so they can't go down the stairs before we're ready for them. From the top of the landing they could see that there weren't any presents in the living room like in years past so they were sweating it a little bit wondering if Santa had even come.

Eagerly awaiting to go downstairs.

Lucy loved everything she got in her stocking and her shopping cart. She threw a fit when we wouldn't let her take her stocking with her to church.

Conner was so excited about his speed stacking set. I think he would have been happy with just that. He played with it all day long. He'd open a gift but then go back to speed stacking. Sam got the Ninjago Lego set Garmedon's Castle and Mikey got 3 Hero Factory guys from Santa.

It was pretty much a lego Christmas. They all got 2-3 sets so the day was spent putting them together and talking on the phone to family. I made breakfast burritos for breakfast and then a bunch of snacks/appetizers to munch on the rest of the day. I was going to make a ham but no one was hungry so that will be saved for another day. Kim and Linda came up for awhile.

We do opening presents a little different at our house. We open one gift and play with it until we're tired of it and then open the next. They opened their second gift at 3pm and their last at 10pm and went to bed at 11pm. It makes the excitement last all day, which I love. I also love being able to stay home and just enjoy the day. I have to say I was as just as excited to see the kids open their presents as they were to open them. I love being a parent! We had a great day and are spending the day after in our pj's watching all their new movies on the projector and playing with the new toys. We plan to go bowling tonight but we may just stay home depending on how everyone feels.

If you have no clue what speed stacking is, here is a little video of Conner. There are different cycles you can do and this is the longest one. The world record is 5.93 seconds. Conner's best time currently is 28.25 seconds. He told me he hopes to get good enough to compete. For those of you who know Conner, can't tell this is something that would be right up his alley. This isn't the best video of him doing it. Whenever I'd try to take a video of him he'd mess up. Usually he does it flawlessly and it's so cool. It looks like he's going in fast forward. At least you get the idea. It's actually pretty fun and addictive.