Merry Christmas Day! We had our family gift exchange in the front room at 9:30.
For the family gifts, we started with Joseph, who had Sophi. Sophi opened her gift and then Sophi had Abi, so Abi went next, and the patter proceeded like that until everyone had opened a gift from their secret santa sibling. So:
- J had S
- S had A
- A had W
- W had L
- L had M
- Mel had H (but he opened it last night haha, so he was kinda bummed today feeling like he didn't get anything for Christmas. At one point he sadly said "Even Wes got legos!" (that was Wesley's gift from Abi, I gave that to her from my stockpile) and Corey commented to Hyrum "Wes got legos because he does NOT have a full beard" Haha!
- H had E (who was not present, but had been sent with him)
- E had N (Ethan had dropped it off here at home)
- N had J
And the little boys had each other ~ Daniel had Peter, and P cheered as he opened a present to find D's old pajamas. He cheered and exclaimed "I always wanted to wear these!" Then there were a few other scattered presents from kids that were in the giving spirit: O gave Abi a box of candy. Abi was wowed with "Opened swedish fish! It doesn't get better than that!" (and O had just wrapped them... they were Corey's gift from Lily! haha)
And Abi gave Lily clothes she didn't want anymore. "Clothes! Yeah! Abi's old wardrobe!" Abi interjected with "...I didn't wash them, but..." lol!
A few other quotes - Joseph pretending to be giving a gift of verbal love "I want you to lookin the mirror and know that you're beautiful" Corey to all: "Joseph is practicing using rhetoric" Then they decided that opening gifts was taking too long, so after Abi gave her gift Joseph said "Yeah, we should pick up the pace" Corey: " You mean not everyone has to give a monologue showing how thoughtful they are?" haha. At 10 am Corey and I received a gift from the college kids, which was the best gift ever and is already declared an instant family classic - they made a "Wride Edition" of the "What Do You Meme" game!
Oh my goodness, SO SO SO FUN and FUNNY!! Weird pictures of each of us that they gathered and put with funny family quotes!
This is gonna be so fun to play! A picture of Ethan flexing for a mirror selfie ~ Mel says "Ethan is featured A LOT in this..."
We played it today over at the Wrides, it's worthy of it's own blog post, so I'll save those pics for later. Katharine opened some presents - I think everyone gave her something. It was cute.
Then over for the real loot - The elementary kids got a physical present, the rest of the kids got $100 cash. It was cheaper than buying them gifts, and faster than being thoughtful. NOT cause we want to be cheap and unthoughtful, it's just that we have been at this for over two decades, and there are still young kids in line for the next two decades of Christmases, so we gotta think long term survival here. To quote Corey today on the reason why we don't have a lot of gifts this year: "I gotta pace myself. This marathon ain't over yet. I still have toddlers." 
They each got a lego set, which we told them we'd have to put together later, cause we had to go meet family at Wasatch Lawn. We gathered there at 11:30.
We had gotten together a few weeks ago to make stars to put on a tree on JeNeal's grave.
Let's see your stars, kids...
Hyrum put a nice Book of Mormon Christmas scripture on there - Alma 7:10-12
They all did a good job. (I didn't make one but that's ok)
Hanging the stars on the tree... It was a little cold. The older kids are all so good to take care of their little brothers and/or cousins.
Mark, Corey, and Nancy visiting.
We sang a few carols and then went to Wayne's house for lunch.
I didn't take pictures there except for when we were playing "What Do You Meme" and again, I'll post those later in their own blog post, so funny. We stayed for a few hours and were back home around 4. Hyrum and Wesley helped their little brothers put together their lego sets. Owen got the Rebel Base, Daniel got a Ninjago Ninja Dogo Temple (very cool) and Peter got the Spider-Man Final Battle. Natalie got a Harry Potter castle. Katharine got on the counter and made a mess of the leftover funeral potatoes, and made some drink concoction out of the water and other food that was left out on the counter.
The Hibberts did a zoom call around 7, that was good to see them even if it was just online.
And for scriptures tonight we read The Living ChristThe Living Christ.
Katharine tuckered out from the day's celebrations. Everyone else is about to fall asleep too.
Ethan and Bella texted us a few photos - looks like it's time for Ethan to say bye to his mustache...
cause Bella got him a new razor!
It was a Merry Christmas. I'm so grateful to be a wife and mother. There's a lot of excitement on Christmas day, and sharing it with all these kids is the best and happiest part of the holiday for us.
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