Christmas Day

Merry Christmas everyone!  Today we celebrate the birth of Christ - so in kid speak "Happy Birthday Jesus!"

In the past several years we have decided to give gifts to others in need, so that is not something new for us.  Over the past four weeks we have studied The Advent Conspiracy.  The Google caption describes it as an international movement restoring the scandal of Christmas by substituting compassion for consumption.  I went into this class thinking yeah, we all need to be more giving, blah, blah, blah.  It was so much more. 

• Worship Fully - it starts with who? and ends with who?  Jesus
• Spend Less - an obvious one, which ties closely with the next
• Give More - at first this may seem to contradict the previous statement, but it's more about giving something with meaning not out of obligation
• Love All - this ties back to the first point - Jesus was an example of perfect love for all of us.  If we are following the principles above, we will have some extra to share with others too.

This class got me motivated to include our kids in the process as well.  Some gifts had already been purchased for this year, but nothing extravagant.  Next year will be a much more inclusive process.  At first I thought I didn't want to take anything away from my kids.  I don't want them to not have gifts to open on Christmas morning.  But really, is that the point?  Is that the life lesson I want to teach them?  I've seen many families going to a specific set like a want, a need, a book and a clothing item.  Maybe 2012 will look like that.  We'll see.

Now onto the cuteness of the morning!  We started off letting the kids open gifts that were sent in from aunts, uncles and cousins.


Aunt Jen scored big points for more Minnie dress up dolls!

And T loved his card featuring Mr Lincoln and Mr Hamilton

Eisley found a Colts colored football, but was just checking to see if there was anything else in the box!

Finally some stockings

And a quick stop for breakfast (I know I'm mean for making them stop opening gifts to eat!).

I was surprised with a bottle of Lady Godiva, a cover for my kindle and a trip to Colorado.  Oh my!  I could tell it was a gift certificate of sorts and thought it was for a pedicure etc.  Every year Sean pulls off something really sweet and he certainly did it again!

Sean and I don't typically exchange gifts, but I wanted to do something meaningful from each of the kids.  Since I didn't think about this or plan ahead (or see the class) we scrambled a little.  Keira brought home a piece of art that matched our living/dining room, so we framed that.  Lexi picked out a big bag of pistachios to share with Daddy.  Tristan has been taking home ec and picked out a couple kitchen gadgets (my lamest idea).

Eisley gave Daddy some peanut butter cookies.  The packaging requires a background story.  Papa has always teased the kids that the dogs left "cookies" for them in the backyard.  So I packaged Sean's cookies in a diaper from Little E.  Sick.  Weird.  Crazy.  Yes, I know, but that's how we roll. 

Keira made it clear that she would really like a doll house over the last few weeks.  We opened all the gifts and told everyone to get ready to head over to Aunt Lori's.  Keira was clearly disappointed.  We brought out a shoebox size gift, which didn't cheer her much.  She mumbled "it's too small to be a doll house."  She opened it and found a bed.  "a bed, really, what am I supposed to do with a bed?"

After some prompting she looked again in the box.  "There's just this piece of paper!"  T suggested maybe she should read the paper rather than just toss it.  Sean had written a clever poem on it telling her to look upstairs for a doll house.

The odd thing was that she ran right to our closet and uncovered the house.  No one had told her where upstairs to go.  Keira confessed that a few days before she and Lexi were playing school and pretending to have walking club around the perimeter of the upstairs.  They accidentally moved the blanket and saw something was there.  She didn't look under the blanket to discover what exactly it was and was smart enough not to say anything about it either.  Needless to say, Keira was thrilled with her doll house.

After getting dressed we were off to Aunt Lori's for lunch and time with the Rich family.  Eisley and Amaiah were out of sorts to start and this pic shows it.  Eisley says "Just put the camera down Mom"  while Mia is thinking "All this sharing is giving me a headache."

The girls quickly warmed up.  And the best gift of all...Eisley showed off what an awesome holiday physical therapist she has.  Uncle Andy had her taking 3 or 4 steps - and happy about it!

Lexi and Laini putting their bears down for a nap in the beds that Great Grandma Rich made for them.

 

I didn't get a picture of it, but I pulled a prank on Uncle Larry.  At Thanksgiving I was looking at the ads and making a list of things I might like to check out on Friday.  Larry got a hold of my list and added a few things, including a PlayStation 3.  I knew we still had the box for ours, so I wrapped it up with some tiles for weight and added some coal candy to the top.  Larry was so surprised that I had a gift for him.  My little joke went over pretty well - that folks is how you spend less and give more!