Christmas

Paige and Cooper on Christmas morning showing off their new hats and such that Santa brought for them in their stockings.

Family photo on Christmas Eve before going to church

Wow, what a busy 3 days we had! The blessings of having our families close by means we get to see almost everyone, but we spend some time running from one place to another. We spent Christmas Eve with my parents, Christmas Day with Ryan's Dad's family; and late Christmas Day evening and part of Sunday with Ryan's Mom. Needless to say, the kids and I are staying home today to recover! Our daycare provider is off, so we happily are using the time to play with new toys and try to get some of the mess cleaned up. Cooper had a great first Christmas and was a super good baby--he handled being passed around and just smiled. Paige got lots of nice presents and really enjoyed the fact that her little brother is too small to open up his presents and she had to do it!

A Visit to Santa

So the time of year is upon us again. Santa is in town, waiting for the children to come sit on his lap and tell him their wishes. The photographer is there waiting to snap pictures of the cute kids. It could be a magical evening, especially if your 4 year old is super excited. She's all dolled up and ready to go. I could tell you the whole story, but I am sure you know how it goes. I'll give you a hint, one of my children sat on Santa's lap and one did not. One of them sat very nicely and smiled for the photographer, even with super tired eyes. Another hint, the one who sat nicely wasn't wearing a dress! She was glued to her Dad or I and sort of stood beside Santa, but was not going too close to him. Oh well, one out of two isn't bad! The plus side is she was excited and very cute in her dress and let me take pictures :)

Merry Christmas

As this Christmas Day nears an end, I thought I better post a few pictures. We had a nice Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. We departed from our normal holiday routine and stayed at our own house for Christmas Eve, something Cowboy and I haven't done as a married couple. We figured Paige was entitled to wake up in her own bed on Christmas morning once. My parents braved the weather and came over on Christmas Eve and we went to mass, and then had a wonderful shrimp supper. Then came the presents. It was a good thing Gramma came over, because the present level quadrupled when she came!

One of Paige's presents she was so excited about; a new princess dress!

Opening up presents from Santa; all smiles. I asked her later in the morning if Santa did a good job. She said, "Santa did a good job." We all slept in this morning which was needed after the late night. Paige slept until after 8:30 and I was walking around the house waiting for her to wake up. The funny thing about her and presents is she only wants to open a few and play with those; she doesn't care if there are a few more remaining. So this morning she played with some stuff; and then opened the remaing 2 an hour later. She also just likes to tear the paper off and look at the box--if its a generic box she thinks that's the present!

Our family gift was a Wii and it has been a lot of fun today keeping us enterained while we wait out the blizzard that is still raging outside. Cowboy got a big game hunting game, complete with gun, and has spent a good chunk of today attempting to master it.

Paige and I attempted some MarioKart this morning; and she did a pretty good job. Mom has to assist with some steering, but for her first attempts she did well. I image in a few years she will be better than Mom or Dad; all kids seem to be that way with video games. Note the big pink castle; that was from Santa and has been a big hit today.



We had a wonderful Christmas despite the blizzard that has shut down the state. We won't be able to go see some family tomorrow like our plan was; but hopefully we'll be able to catch up with them in a weekend or two.

On the 10th day of Christmas. . .

On the 10th day of Christmas, my true love gave to me. . .gift wrapped presents under the tree-eee. (If you sing it, it rhymes.)

The beauty being we had only 3 presents under the tree, and he came home disgusted that the massive pile of Target bags hadn't wrapped themselves. So he went through the stack and is in the living room right now wrapping presents. This is not a normal occurance at our home that he wraps the gifts. He secludes himself to wrap mine; and that's it. I just finished up Christmas cards; so we are officially in Christmas prep at our home.

The downside of Christmas fast approaching is our household is trying to get over some colds. I stayed home today with my head cold; and Paige is almost over hers. Cowboy, of course, is never sick. The good thing is since we are all feeling poorly this week, we'll be healthy in time for Christmas!