Christmas

So, I am finally getting around to posting our Christmas Happenings. Life has been a bit busy here and I am sure there will be posts to come explaining all of that.

To recap, on Christmas we split the days between our families. Christmas Eve was spent with my side of the family, Christmas morning we spend together just the 5 of us, and Christmas Day we travel to Chattanooga to celebrate with Scott's family.

Christmas Eve was a blast with all the kids. Adam, Christina, Matthew, and Wesley were all there and our kids loved having them to celebrate with. Mom, as always cooked a great dinner, and then we began the present opening. Catherine definitely won the prize for the funniest stunt ever, when she decided that she could carry her new blocks. This was a huge bag of foam style blocks and she just threw it over her shoulder like it was nothing.... until that nothing pulled her right over backwards and on her behind. I wish I would have had it on video because it was the most hilarious thing I've ever seen- of course until she started bawling at being the source of all our laughter.

We went home Christmas Eve and opened our one present. The kids all changed into their Christmas PJ's and went to bed. Catherine and Harbin got to have a sleepover in Catherine's room, but we still thought it was best to leave Lydia to rest in the crib.

Scott LOVES Christmas morning and was up super early. He fixed cinnamon rolls and then had to do all he could not to wake the kids up. We finally aroused them out of bed by not being "so quiet" anymore and I quickly scurried downstairs to take the pictures. Harbin was hilarious... he came down the stairs, ran over to the guitar that Santa had left and asked "Catherine, why did Santa put my new guitar next to your stocking." Then you could see it on his face, he suddenly realized that the guitar was not for him, but it was Catherine's!!! He was ok with that, but it was funny to watch how he processed the whole thing in his head. Santa brought Lydia a pink shopping cart, which she would have been content with the whole day. Harbin got a Polar Express train set that complements the train table and other tracks we already have.

I break a lot of rules on Christmas and one of those is junk food. It's Christmas...who cares how much candy the kids eat. Well, apparently my little candy fanatic- Lydia- needs some boundaries. We dumped her stocking out and she started by "hoarding" all the candy. It was like she thought it was a pinata free for all!!! We let her eat and eat and eat and finally she kind of got loopy and I decided enough was enough. You can see the picture of her screaming- that would have been when mommy said no more candy!! The kids really enjoy getting to shop for one another and they really love getting to give their presents. Harbin picked out pom-poms for both the girls. Catherine picked out magic tricks for Harbin and princess slippers for Lydia. And, Lydia picked out a racecar paintable suncatcher for Harbin and a Tinkerbell Sticky Ball toss for Catherine.

After loading the car and eating cinnamon rolls (which is no longer a tradition in our familly since the sugar was too much- anyone know any good breakfast casserole recipes) we headed up to Chattanooga. Scott wanted to do some work on the Jeep while we were up there, so we drove two cars- the older kids were excited to get to ride with daddy and it was helpful to have two cars to get all the new presents home.

We arrived in Chattanooga and the kids immediately began opening even MORE presents...and MORE presents...and MORE presents. It sort of looked like Toys R' Us the day after Thanksgiving when they were done. We enjoyed some leftover Christmas Breakfast and time with family as they stopped in to say hello.

And finally, congrats to my sis-in-law, Crickett. She got engaged on Christmas Eve and we are so excited to see her get married this May!

Check back soon for a link to all the Christmas pictures- as usual they are taking a long time to load, but once they do I will put a link on the right side of the blog.

Merry Christmas!
The mom.