Merry Christmas Eve! This is the day that Natalie has been counting down to for the past three weeks for and now it has finally arrived!!
Stephen had the day off, so we hang out at home, wrapping gifts, playing games and just being together. Funny, as I was wrapping I had a total “I’m turning into my mom” moment! I had sorted the kids gifts out on the bed only to realize that Natalie had 7 gifts and Jadyn only had 3, while the boys had 5 gifts each……and then I had the “moment”. My mom used to always worry about not having an equal amount of gifts per kid (and I always thought that worry was crazy) but there I sat on the floor staring at the gifts wondering how I could make 7 and 3equal!! Well, that’s impossible!! But Jadyn I am sure will not notice!!
We had an early dinner and then went to the Christmas Eve service at church. Jadyn has been feeling pretty yucky the past few days, so I wasn’t sure if she should really go to the service, but I REALLY wanted to go, so we all went. The service was so nice. I just LOVE having a Christmas Eve service. It just seems to put the right focus on the meaning of Christmas.
We arrived home and the kids were SO excited to open their special Christmas Eve gift. Everyone sat around the tree and opened their gift. Jadyn was the only one who needed help getting the wrapping off……Natalie and Jadyn had white PJs with black and pink paw prints.
The boys had matching light blue PJs with polar bears and penguins. Ben was SO excited to have “church” PJs. Took us a bit to figure out how they were “church” PJs..…….the PJs were a top and bottom set and the shirt buttoned up and had a pocket on the right side, just like a “church”shirt! Ben loved that they buttoned, not zipped. And Jadyn loved that her PJs had a doggie on them…..she loves dogs!!
A Christmas miracle happened……Jeremiah for the first time in4 or 5 years actually wore a pair of PJs! And he LOVED them! His exact words were……”oh wow, they are so soft.” So there you go…..miracles do happen!
Once the gifts were opened the kids went to get their sleeping bags and pillows for the annual book reading and camp-out. Each year for the past 4 or 5 years Stephen has read The Prince’s Poison Cup.
And amazingly, I had somehow missed packing that book away with the two trillion other books that we own, so this year we were able to continue the tradition! Jadyn was able to join in for part of the reading before she was scuttled off to her crib.
It took the kids quite a while to fall asleep and Natalie ended up sleeping on the couch, but finally all tired eyes caved in sleep and “Santa”could deliver the gifts to the Christmas tree!! Sneaking into the living room with the gifts is always one of my most favorite events of Christmas Eve!
Luke 2:12
“And this will be a sign for you:
you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths
and lying in a manger.”
Christmas morning started early…..VERY early. I heard the bathroom door slam shut about 5:30. And then slam shut again at 5:35 and then again five minutes later!! So I knew at least 3 out of my 5 elves were awake. But we didn’t actually start Christmas morning until about 7:30. Before opening gifts, we read the last chapter in Tabitha’s Travels. We have LOVED reading this book this advent season. The kids literally BEG for “just one more chapter, please Papa?” every night. And I love how the author weaves the story of the birth of Christ into a fictional story of a shepherd girl and at the end of each chapter questions bring the story back to Jesus.
And then it was gift time! We always start with the youngest, so Jadyn got to go first. Only Jadyn was really more interested in everyone else’s gifts rather than her own!
Benjamin was so excited about each and every gift and he said “oh thank you so much” after opening each one.
Natalie had a bit of a tough Christmas. She later told me that she was hoping for Legos and there were no Legos in her pile of gifts.
Jeremiah was excited about all of his gifts, but surprised me once again by his enthusiasm about his Old Navy sweatshirt. This boy has NEVER liked sweatshirts and HATES anything that resembles a coat. But he was so happy about his sweatshirt and wore it all Christmas day.
Getting gifts has always been a huge deal to Carlos, so naturally he really likes Christmas. I think his favorite gift was a toss-up between his hair gel and his new (non-kid) Bible.
But of course, we saved the biggest gift for very last. For the longest time Stephen and I have been debating getting our kids a certain electronic gift. I’m not much for electronic gaming, but Stephen loves all that stuff, so how much we allow our kids always brings up a big discussion……not a big discussion in a bad way…….most of the discussion is how much/often should the kids play. With our Wii, we found a simple solution…..I don’t “know how” to work the Wii, thus,the kids can’t play unless Stephen plays with them……works great and they NEVER ask me if they can play……and so I never have to tell them no…..win-win for mama!!
About three weeks ago we started talking about buying the kids a Nintendo DS for Christmas. The cost of the DS is about half what it was even a year ago……so we talked and looked at the ads in the paper to find deals. Then I got an idea……CraigsList and boy was that a great idea! We found two DS plus 8 games (two were inappropriate for kids, but the other 6 were perfect) for just over the cost of one brand new DS. It was a great deal for us!
The kids were SO excited about the DS, especially Carlos and Jeremiah. It’s funny because Jeremiah knew right away what the gift was……that little gamer! Natalie too is a little gamer. She loves playing the DS. Ben gets frustrated and can’t quite figure out how to play the games we have, so we might need to find him some easier games.
This year seemed to be the year of the games because not only did the kids get electronic games, but they also got 5 or 6 “regular”games too! So after opening the gifts it was time to play with the gifts……so that’s what Stephen did with the kids while I made a big Christmas breakfast!
Testing out the hair gel! It works…..it really works 🙂
Merry Christmas
from
the House of Smooches
House of Smooches 