Christmas 2010

Christmas is a special time with a 4 and 2 year old in the house. Because of baby's pending arrival, we didn't have any family guests from Kansas this year. We were, however, blessed to spend Christmas Eve with good friends eating green chili tamales, homemade soup and pecan pie. As in years past, the Christmas Elves stopped by our house on Christmas Eve and delivered new pajamas for the girls...

 This was the first year we were concerned about what insane time the girls would wake on Christmas morning. Claire has been waking at 5am or so since May, so we anticipated an early start to the day. And so, at 5:30am, Claire began rustling under the tree in the living room. Knowing Claire would not go back to sleep, I woke Lilly saying, "Lilly, Santa was here." She opened her eyes wide and asked, "Is it morning time?" Even though it was pitch black outside, she hopped out of bed. We spent quite awhile playing with gifts from Santa and opening gifts from family and friends. Here are a few of the highlights... Santa brought matching robes for the girls, a LeapFrog Tag system for Lilly...

A sit-and-spin for Claire...

Jewelery boxes and jewelery too...

Lilly couldn't wait to give me the gift she picked especially for me... "fuzzy flip-flops" for my poor swollen feet.

We took a break from gift opening to let the sun come up, to eat homemade monkey bread and to let the girls have a warm bubble bath.

Once the gift unwrapping resumed, we opened this little goody from Nana...

Lilly is fond of princesses and is also looking forward to being a flower girls in Aunt Colleen's wedding next summer. So, this book, veil, gloves and diamond ring from Aunt Colleen were perfect gifts...

We smoked a turkey on our grill and made a wild rice stuffing, steamed green beans, rolls and dessert... we took it easy this year. Here we are before our evening meal...

And, here we are just before singing happy birthday to Jesus. Lilly chose to make him a homemade carrot cake- as she licked the frosting from the beaters of the hand mixer she told me, "Mmmmm, Jesus is going to love this!"

And the rest of the weekend was spent at home playing with all of the fun things the girls received for Christmas... and playing with dad, of course. Here are the girls riding on their "tiger" around the family room.

We hope your Christmas was merry and bright!
Thank you, everyone, for the gifts, cards and warm holiday wishes you sent our way.