Good morning, Christmas! I have mixed feelings about having Christmas on Sunday. I'd like it if we focused more on the Holy and sabbath part of it, (which is the real reason for the whole Christmas holiday anyway, right?) But it seemed to be like a regular day instead of a Sunday to me. We did go to church at 11 but it was just for sacrament meeting. I would have preferred to have the full block. I know, I'm weird. I'd actually love it if church were longer... in Sunday school and Relief Society, the lessons and discussion always seems to need to be cut short because of time. One reason why our Wednesday study group is so great, cause we can go as long as we want to! Anyway, back to Christmas...
So, I think Lily was the first one up. The teenagers all slept in for the first time ever. Lily passed out stockings but got it all messed up. We hadn't put names on them, I just put them in order. Note to self, put names on or in them next time. I had put a bunch of stuff in Daniel's stocking that I wanted to divy up for the rest of them, but Lily gave that to Mel. We got it all sorted out. When Corey finally came down, the kids passed out presents that they got for each other. Those were the gifts in the front room where they all had their sleepover. Then we went into the side room for presents from Corey and I.
So, it snowed a ton last night. I was worried that we wouldn't be able to get to church on time if we opened presents before church. But the vote was to do it before, and we did, and we were late. Oh well. Hyrum, Wes and Abi did a good job getting ready for church first.
I even dressed up Daniel for church in this little outfit we got when Wes was a baby. Wesley's 2 month picture was in this little outfit (see
the second photo, 5th kid), Daniel looked so cute!!
I was cracking up every time I saw him, so stinkin' cute. Put on his Sunday best for Jesus today. :) The older kids were taking advantage of sleep, so they were still in pjs.
Abi bought Joseph some slime. I made some bacon and eggs for a semi-real food breakfast before they binge on junk all day. My offering wasn't accepted by most of the kids.
Well, they ate the bacon, not so much the eggs, as demonstrated by Ethan above. He's also there showing off his eos chapstick that was supposed to be in Lily's stocking, Owen favorite presents were these two shape things I got at kid to kid. Especially the one where you hammer in the balls and they roll out, he loves that one. I like shopping for toddlers for Christmas, they're easy.
Older kids are getting harder. Well, Corey says they're not harder, you just have to spend more.
That there above is a picture of the calm after the Christmas storm. Kinda messy with the wrapping all off, but that's easy enough to clean up. But once they start un-boxing, that's when the real mess begins. Our house looks like it's been hit by a Christmas atomic bomb. But no time to clean up yet... Corey went out to clear the driveway and the everyone got dressed.
After church the kids went out to help our neighbor shovel his driveway and we cleared off our driveway again.
Luckily it stopped snowing the rest of the day and was still clear after we got back from Corey's parent's house. We went there for a nice Christmas dinner and more gift exchanging. Natalie with candy on her face and coloring books on her lap.
The kids got toys and clothes and body wash. Wes felt surprised and a little guilty to be at the receiving end of such generosity by his grandparents.
I think they had a good day. Not sure if there will be anything in particular that stands out in their memories this Christmas, other that the fact that they only got "one week" off of school. I'm sure we'll spend the rest of the week recovering from having so many material things. I trust I will be sorting through bins and piles in an attempt to pass on stuff they don't play with anymore. Glad we survived another Christmas! phew
