Christmas!

We were woken at 5:30a.m. on Christmas morning to the pitter patter of little feet. Well, it really was more than a pitter patter (it's hard to be quiet when dragging a large pink rubber donkey down the stairs)!:) None-the-less we listened as Lily came down the stairs, stopped in the living room for a few moments, and then came running into our bedroom. With incredible excitement in her voice she exclaimed, "Mommy, Santa came! And he did bring my doll stroller!" Oh, it was precious and exactly what I was hopping for (though I had hoped it might happen a little later in the morning)! Because it was so early and Eli was still sleeping we managed to hold her off for a bit (snuggling in our bed and then eventually watching a video in our room). Finally though we just couldn't wait anymore. So Joe made a fire and the three of us started opening gifts (we figured it might be nice for Lily to open a few before Eli joined us).

She was pretty excited about this gift (a Princess book for the V-Reader she got from my parents)!

And after we opened just a few gifts Eli woke up to join us. He loved the drum that Santa brought for him!

And once he was awake we opened our stockings (Lily's had this butterfly puppet), enjoyed our Christmas breakfast (cinnamon rolls), and opened the rest of the gifts.

Previous to Christmas morning Eli had gotten really interested in gifts. So much so that we thought that opening gifts might be a bit challenging for him and Lily (since he is so curious and wants to be a part of opening every gift). But after a couple he actually seemed more interested in just playing with a few of them (like these light up balls)- and we even let Lily help open his last few gifts. It went so much better than we expected!

Lily enjoyed playing with her play silks right away making them into a dress!

And this wooden horse barn was her other big gift and she loved it (also playing with it right away)!

And after all of the gifts were open Lily continued to play and Eli napped for a few hours (so long that I had to wake him up). In fact, I managed to go into his room, pick out his clothes, and he was still asleep. So I snuck back downstairs and grabbed my camera (since I don't have any recent sleeping pictures of this little boy). Oh, he's just so cute (and a tad bit obsessed with his blankets in case you didn't notice)!

I'm not sure why I thought this would go well, but after I woke Eli up I tried to snap a few quick pictures of the two of them before we had to leave for Joe's parent's house. Eli was not really in the mood.

And they had had enough!

But we ended on a happy note with Lily giving Eli a little love.

After the pictures we left right away for Joe's parents house. We got there just in time for a wonderful Christmas dinner.

And sledding!

Joe's parents live at the top of this great hill and it's wonderful for sledding with the kids!

It was so good to get out and get some fresh air and exercise among all the food, goodies, and gifts!

Uncle Donald and the cousins

And then I had to come back inside because our sweet little boy refused to nap. So I may have missed out on some sledding, but I did get to enjoy some delicious dessert and play time with the little ones!

Our little elf just didn't want to have his picture taken this day!

And then things began to wind down. The kids got their pajamas on and everyone sort of just relaxed and snuggled in.

It really was a delightful Christmas!

And we were all exhausted (even I went to bed around 8p.m.)!

We hope that your Christmas was as joyful as ours!