Christmas Celebrations

I was pretty excited for this on Christmas:Christmas gets more and more exciting as our children get older, and start getting in to the magic of the Holiday. True, presents and Santa and reindeer aren't the real meaning of Christmas, but it is still so fun to mess with their heads. Don't you remember the magic that existed around this season for you, as a child? Plus, there is the added benefit of children being on their best behavior.
Christmas fell on a Sunday, so it made for some very nice post church pictures. For once, instead of messy hair and pajamas, we had on pretty dresses and ties. We let them have their stockings to sort through before church, but decided to wait until after our meetings for the big things. The kids were pretty antsy to get out of church and home to their presents.
This year Maryn treated Kade and me to a grand array of homemade presents. (The best kind in my book!)

She's become quite the artist, and loves to write sweet little notes to us. In addition, we had lots of miscellaneous items (or "junk that she didn't want any more," as she put it) that were wrapped up in scrapbook paper.

Santa was good to us this year. Kade scored an NBA TV package, and I got some fun tools to assist me in my most current hobby, wood working. Cora had the least demanding wish list, and got a pretty, little, bouncy ball....

...that mostly Ailee has been playing with.

Ailee, our little domestic diva, got a cute little kitchen from Santa. As an accessory, I found the cutest set of pink pots and pans, for her. They had her name all over them.

Maryn had been pining for a My Little Pony since about August. Luckily for us, Santa pulled through. Santa's elf, who has recently taken up wood working, also worked hard to make her a fun little picnic table.

We ended our day with a delicious dinner with some of our new friends here in the area. It was nice to have enjoyable company to help us celebrate this season. I think we all had a good Christmas. Now it's on the New Year...and all that comes with it (hopefully a successful new practice for Kade).