Christmas Day!!

I usually look forward to Christmas morning more than any other day of the year. I have a Christmas Eve/Christmas Morning routine that I have followed for years. USUALLY, this is what it looks like: After celebrating with my family in Nampa, the kids settle down in the living room on the couch so they can wake up and see the gifts under the tree. I putter around, cleaning things up and wrapping stocking stuffers until the kids fall asleep. As soon as I hear soft snoring sounds coming from the couch I start setting out their gifts and filling up their stockings. We've never done the Santa thing so I don't really worry about getting caught but the kids like to be surprised so even if they are faking it, they don't let me know it! While I'm setting out the gifts, I play my favorite Christmas CD's softly on the stereo and light all the candles in the house. The lights on the tree are glowing as well as the lights that are strung around the inside living room windows. It's really the only night of the year that I'm the last one asleep. I'm also the first one up on Christmas morning. The first thing I do is make coffee and preheat the oven for the cinnamon rolls. I turn the Christmas music back on and wait for the kids to wake up. If they aren't awake by the time I'm ready to start the day, I put on my favorite Christmas song of all time, Rich Mullins' You Gotta Get Up:






By the time everyone is awake and the kids are opening their socks, the coffee and the cinnamon rolls are ready and we have a nice, relaxing morning opening gifts. . .



That's how we USUALLY experience Christmas morning. This year was the exception. Due to Emma's surgery and subsequent pain and anguish, Christmas Eve right through to Christmas morning was a blur of trying to calm Emma down while listening to Gloria cough all night. I managed to fill the stockings and put the gifts under the tree in between Emma's episodes but there was little sleep to be had. The worst came at about 4 in the morning when Emma needed to go out to do her business but instead ran around like someone possessed while Rob and I chased her in the cold, frozen, dark back yard trying to keep her from ripping her stitches open. Needless to say by the time the kids were up and ready to open gifts, I hadn't made any coffee and Rich Mullins' voice was absent from Christmas morning for the first time in about 10 years.


For the sake of the kids, I put on a happy face and eventually turned on the music, made the cinnamon rolls and lit the candles but I wasn't feeling a whole lot of Christmas joy!!

I did eventually get into the spirit of things as the kids began opening the things I had carefully and thoughtfully picked out for them. It wasn't easy finding this classic Star Wars Monopoly game for Zach!!

Despite coughing all night, Gloria still happily opened the things she had put on her wish list. . .

I was pretty spoiled, too. Sharpies always make me feel better!!

We took our time opening gifts and by the time my parents arrived to wish us a Merry Christmas, I was in a much better mood. . .

This is the Holiday Barbie set from 1998, the year Gloria was born. Gotta love E-bay. . .

Gloria finally opened her main gift: a sparkly, pink, electric guitar. . .

Too bad Rob wouldn't let her play it until he tuned it. . .

Zach takes the longest to open his gifts because he takes time to enjoy each and every one of them as he unwraps them. He's always been that way. When he was little it would literally take him all day long to open all of his gifts. . .

He was pretty happy with his Luke and Lea action figures. By the way, it isn't the prisoner Lea, she was too expensive. . .

After about a 45 minute tuning, Gloria finally got her hands on her guitar. . .

Zach still had presents to open when my parents got there, so they were able to get in on a little bit of the gift opening. . .

Just what every 17 year old boy needs . . .

We packed up a few of our things and the rest of the gifts and headed over to the in-laws around noon. Unfortunately, Emma had to go with us. We were still able to enjoy a few more hours of gift opening while we took turns checking on her. . .

We really take our time with family gifts which is nice. Everyone sits in a circle in the living room and we open them one by one. It's not that we have a ton of stuff, it just takes awhile as we enjoy watching each person open their presents. . .

We took a little time to play with our gifts. . .

Gloria played a little Christmas-y Smoke On The Water. . .

Dinner, as usual, was delicious. . .

Topped off by lots and lots of goodies. . .

We called it a day in the late afternoon but took a family picture before everyone went on their way. . .

So, it wasn't our usual, traditional Christmas but we spent the day with family and by the end of the day, we were tired but happy. Plus, we gave Emma a Valium that Jeanie had leftover from her dog's last procedure so that made everything better. It's amazing what a good night's sleep will do for you!