Merry Christmas

As a kid, my family always opened all our Christmas presents on Christmas Eve night & then Christmas morning, we would wake up & see what Santa brought us. But in Nick's family they opened everything on Christmas morning. So of course, we have different ideas of how we should celebrate Christmas with the kids. (And have been battling over this for the past couple of years!)

Last year, we got home pretty late in the evening from my mom & dad's house. The kids were tired & Santa & Mrs. Clause still had a lot of work to do & so we waited until Christmas morning to open gifts (score 1 for Nick.) And the year before that, well I have no idea what we did, I just remember that that was the first year for us to be home on Christmas morning.

But this year was different. We celebrated earlier in the day at mom & dad's house & so we got home with plenty of time to open gifts. But guess what, ALEX DID NOT WANT TO OPEN ANY PRESENTS ON CHRISTMAS EVE NIGHT! NOT. EVEN. ONE! He said they all had to be opened on Christmas morning. (Yep, it's official, Nick has brainwashed my son, lol!)

So instead of opening gifts on Christmas Eve night, we started a new tradition. We read a book called The Pajama Elves. It says that there are elves that bring special Christmas Eve pajamas to good boys & girls to help them sleep soundly while Santa comes. The elves can leave the pajamas anywhere, wrapped in a box, laying out somewhere, or even under the pillows on your bed. When the story was over, the kids ran to their rooms to check to see if they had some new pajamas. And of course they did! (They were under their pillows but they were NOT wrapped because my brainwashed son would not have wanted to open them, lol.)

While the kids were sleeping (soundly in their new pajamas) Santa & Mrs. Clause got to work putting everything together. Addy got lots of As Seen on TV stuffed animals, some My Little Pony stuff & a marble run. Alex got some Hot Wheels tracks & cars & the Ninja Turtle Secret Sewer Lair. And they both got plasma cars (which they have been riding around the house nonstop since Christmas!)

Christmas morning, Nick was awake first, drinking coffee in the playroom. He heard some noises & walked into the living room & saw Alex sitting in the middle of all the toys. Alex said  "Daddy, Santa came!" Nick told him to come wake Addy & me up so that we could open presents. I was already walking into the living room at that point. So Alex ran past me into Addy's room & yelled "Addy, get up! Santa came!" I've never seen that girl move faster! She threw the covers off, jumped out of bed & they both ran back into the living room & got busy checking everything out.

Here are a few pictures of the kids opening & playing with their presents on Christmas morning.