I would like to report that the kids all slept peacefully through the night, but that didn’t happen! Chloe was awake for a good couple of hours just being cranky. She would fall asleep and then we would move her back to her bed and then she’d just come walking back into our room and climbing back into our bed a few minutes later. During that time I saw Ethan come out into the hall and look like he was going to walk towards the living room. I told him not to go out there and he instantly turned and went to the bathroom. I took Chloe back to her bed and sat with her a bit to wait for her to fall asleep, at which point Tyra woke up wanting to know if it was morning. So the two oldest were the ones awake in the middle of the night hoping it was time to get Christmas started and Chloe was just not sleeping well. The only ones that actually slept were Jeremy and Dinah!
By 7 all the kids were awake (Ethan and Tyra were awake first though and I had to put up the child gate to keep them down the hall so they couldn’t go out before the little ones were awake) and so we turned them loose on the living room. They went for their stockings first. The boys got some small lego sets and a couple of cars characters, and the girls got Care Bear toys. Ethan got right to work assembling his legos:
And the girls were excited to play with their new care bears:
Kyle got the Moon Spinners on dvd and a new ps2 controller extension. I got the Pajama Game on dvd. While the kids were playing with the stuff in their stockings (and eating the candy they got) I preheated the oven and got breakfast started. Frozen turnovers are so EASY and we love doing that for breakfast Christmas morning.
Santa kept the candy simple this year too. Candy canes on the tree, and plastic candy canes filled with long laffy taffy’s in the kids stockings. Of course the kids were pigs about it. 😛
After eating breakfast, (which Dinah and Jeremy didn’t want to eat, surprising?) we went back to the living room to open presents. We kept things VERY simple this year. Every year we get each of the kids something they want, something they need, something to wear, and something to read. In the past we have gone crazy with this and they have gotten one or two things they want from us and another one from Santa. They have gotten pjs on Christmas eve AND something else nice to wear to open Christmas morning, and a couple of books each. This year we toned it down BIG TIME. The girls all got a set of Care Bear toys as their want, Ethan got battleship and Jeremy got hungry, hungry, hippos. Ethan and Dinah were they only ones that got a need this year (because I couldn’t pin down a need for the others) and Ethan got his cub scout uniform, and Dinah got a set of scriptures and a crayon bank to keep her weekly earnings in. For the something to wear they all got jammies, which they opened last night, and each of them got ONE book this year. See we toned it down quite a bit this year and I actually had it all bought and wrapped weeks in advance!
I love how happy Chloe was to unwrap and get to look at her book. When Ethan upwrapped his book, his face was much like the one when he found pjs in the package last night.
I gave Kyle a pair of slippers from the kids (which they had told him about weeks ago when I bought them), a corn dog maker, and “The Jungle Book” by Rudyard Kipling. Kyle got me a second bowl for the kitchenaid, (but it doesn’t fit so we’ll have to exchange it) and a beater with rubber around it so that it scrapes the sides and bottom of the bowl as it mixes. Santa brought the kids a little people nativity set, a whole bunch of movies for the family and “The Secret Garden” for me (so everyone got a new book this year!).
The afternoon, the kids spent playing with their new things. Ethan and Tyra played a game of battleship. We had yummy sandwiches with our favorite deli meat for lunch. And we watched a few of our new movies. In the evening Debby and Jeff came out for a visit (which worked out because I wasn’t sure when we would be able to get their presents to them) and were here for dinner which ended up being a pot of homemade chicken soup.
Chloe had a REALLY late nap which meant that she was too awake at bed time to go back to sleep, so Kyle and I stayed up late with her and watched the Pajama Game. Thankfully Chloe was asleep by the time the movie was over because I am tired!
It’s been a really good day. I really enjoy staying home and doing nothing Christmas day. The house is a huge mess because I did nothing, but whatever.
