Christmas morning! I always get so excited so I wake up earlier than everyone else! Once the sun is up and everyone is awake they all pile into our bed. Then I go downstairs and check out the scene, put breakfast in the oven, turn on music and light the you tube fire! In the meantime the boys are anxiously awaiting me to tell them to come down and Max is showing them videos about the birth of Christ.
Our first year having matching stockings!! I've been so excited about them, and since we don't have a mantel, we were super excited that this shelf which we inherited from Marissa and Richard fit our stockings perfectly.
Santa left out some family activities We've been wanting to get the game q-bits for a long time and all the boys (and parents) love it. And we're excited for more toy story!
I have a somewhat strict order of events on Christmas morning.
1. We check to see what Santa left, sometimes there is an unwrapped gift by the tree or sometimes it is the ...
2. Stockings. We then Check out the loot in the stockings. All while breakfast is cooking...
3. Then we sit at the table and eat (sometimes the kids get a juice in their stocking that they can eat with breakfast)
4. Then we can go back to the living room and the boys pass out the gifts under the tree and we start opening them very slowly, one at a time starting from youngest to oldest.
We make sure this process goes very slow and takes HOURS!
Anyway, checking out their new game, and they decided they wanted to play it right away, why not? We busted out the game and just went with the flow.
The Puffy pancakes were ready in the meantime...
We then dug into the stockings.
We started this new manger tradition this year. There is a kit you can buy but we decided to make our own, I tried making the manger but it didn't turn out great so max made this one, the chickens donated some of their hay and Max carved a baby Jesus out of soap and painted it with pearly white nail polish. Just another one of his newly found skills!
The idea is to set the manger up during the Christmas season and each time a someone does an act of service or kindness, they can add a piece of hay to the manger. Then on Christmas you set the baby Jesus in the manger and the idea is to have enough hay in the manger to make a comfortable bed.
The boys made this nativity set up during our breakfast after we set baby Jesus in the manger.
We then started the enjoyably slow process of opening the gifts one at a time.
Disco Ball, the boys destroyed his old one, haha, and pretty much every night since Christmas has been a dance party. (We gotta wear these kids out somehow during the winter)
For Max's main gift, from me, I felt strongly that he didn't need any"thing" and what I believe is inspiration, it hit me that the most meaningful thing I could do for him was send him to go visit his best friend in Nashville. After some conspiring with Richard and Marissa, We were able to pick a day (week) for Max to visit. I was able to find super affordable plane tickets. and then figure out how to present the present...ha, English is weird)
Anyway, we decided to give him some clues because that would be more fun for him to open, So
Clue one was a haiku
After he read the clue I played some Elvis music on the piano, he guessed it after the first song.
Clue two was an airplane with Max's picture in it (the picture was taken with Richard, I just cut Max's head out of it.
Clue 3, I found the only Nashville travel book from the library and wrapped it,
Clue 4 had the flight plans and another attractive picture of Max with Richard.
His trip will be in May and he was so so so surprised and excited. It was the best seeing him open each clue.
Max totally surprised me as well, days before Christmas he had run some errands with Charlie and for the next while they were being super secretive in the garage. Miles went out to help them work as well. Max had asked what I wanted for Christmas but I really truly didn't need or want anything. I feel like I have been so spoiled this year with going to Costa Rica and getting Lasik surgery that I just didn't want anything else. I told him if he felt he needed to get a gift it could be fun to get jewelry picked out from each kid. So he took that and ran with is. On Christmas day I got presented with Jewelry from each boy and my personal favorite, this beaded beauty from my friend Jalynne who does traditional Cree beadwork and makes amazing things. But that's not all, he and Jalynne worked together to create a design and pick the colors that they knew I would love and it just meant so much to me. I've been ogling over her amazing work for a long time but still wasn't sure what I wanted to order from her but they made me the perfect custom set!
Anyway, back to the garage project that Charlie and Max were working on...it ended up not being completely done until Christmas night. but then he presented me with this beautiful jewelry holder. He had looked at a couple different designs but then made something completely unique and he used many scraps oof things we already had. The bracelet bar is an old broom handle, the framing is some old molding from a house we worked on and the chicken wire is from...the chickens. haha! He knows I love being cheap and reusing things. haha. Charlie picked out the blue "mermaid" fabric background and the blue crystal knobs and contributed to the creation of it. Needless to say, I was so impressed. I knew my husband is skilled and will figure out new skills when he wants but I didn't know he could make something so nice looking and sturdy without a pattern! I just felt so loved. I need to take a picture in better lighting but this is what I got.
This was just extra meaningful since he made it unique and involved Charlie and it was a special project they did together and Charlie had some say in the details and it is a very useful gift. So many wins!
Anyway, I got a little ahead of myself. For lunch my boys ate cereal that they unwrapped and then played with some new toys for awhile. We then made our way to my moms house to have Christmas dinner and visit them for awhile.
It was an incredibly joyous day, we didn't feel rushed in the least. We were able to do legos and art with the boys, Everything was low-key at my moms house and we just enjoyed our time together as a family. Christmas is such a wonderful time to show your family extra love and time and we all loved it.
Wow okay you guys win for most thoughtful gifts! Love how your clues turned out. And max! Great job on the gifts and that jewelry rack is legit! Even better with the details of a broom and old wood. It truly holds memories and stories in it.
ReplyDelete