Another Christmas gone by

And as fast as it came upon us, it left.  Christmas is now officially over.  Christmas this year seemed to be especially fast and especially busy.  After all was said and done, we had 6 Christmases to attend, including our own.  That was a lot of get togethers, a lot of food, a lot of presents, a lot of happy kids, a lot of smiles, laughter and pictures.  In fact, so many pictures and presents that I'm having a hard time deciding which ones to post.  So I've decided to narrow it down to our own family Christmas.


When Natalli was born we decided that Christmas day was going to be a day for our family.  It was important for us to have the time together as a family, welcome Santa, to eat and open presents.  If part of our extended family wanted to come to our house to help us celebrate, that was perfectly fine, but we were not going to leave the comforts of our house.  And so far, it's made us extremely happy in our decision.


The night before we leave out cookies and milk for Santa, we write him a letter that waits patiently next to the cookies and we sprinkle a mixture of reindeer food out on the front lawn.  Then the next morning, after a long and peaceful snooze, the kids wake up to this:

The first thing we do after the kids wake us up is to see what Santa left in their stockings, which of course, were hung by the gas fireplace with care.  And besides the lovely stocking stuffers that Santa so carefully placed, he left each child their own cowboy hat, to which Konner was EXTREMELY happy!

My little cowboy

After the hats were eagerly put on their heads and their stockings were gone through with excitement, it was on to see what Santa had brought them and if it fulfilled their wish...and boy were they pleased!  It was a good thing they were good this year!

Heath got a robotic Buzz Lightyear

Konner got his Toy Story Geotrax train

Natalli got her Barbie jet

After presents were opened, wrapping paper picked up and toys opened and put together, it was time for playing, eating and lounging on our fabulous Christmas day!

We wrestled with daddy....

We played the Wii....

And we hung out and acted like goofs!

Christmases just keep getting more fun as the years go by.  The anticipation of Santa and the ripping open of presents brings me back to my own childhood.  And there is nothing better than to see the joy on your children's faces when they walk down Christmas morning and see that someone sneaked into their house the night before while they were sleeping and left them presents!


Christmas may be over for now, but with as fast as it came up last year, it will be here again before we know it!