Life In Llama Land: The Perfect Christmas

I don't think I could have asked for a better Christmas.On Christmas Eve we went to see the movie Avatar in 3D. I really enjoyed it even though I didn't think I would. It probably helped that Caleb slept through the whole movie so I actually had a chance to enjoy it. When we got out of the movie it was SNOWING! We haven't had a good snow storm here in years. I told my kids that I "ordered snow" as part of my Christmas planning so they keep calling it "Mommy's snow." It snowed all night long so I got my wish of a white Christmas! We've had a ton of snow since then too. We spent Christmas day as a family and just stayed home enjoying the day. The kids all gave gifts to each other. If you figure that out that's 7 kids times 8 people to give to equals 56 gifts. Crazy! But I think it's important and fun for them to think about each other and get into the spirit of Christmas giving. It worked because they were more excited to give their gifts out than open their own. We opened presents one at a time so it made it last longer. (Maybe too long because it seemed like they opened gifts all day.) Here are some pics of the kids on Christmas Morning.

First, here they are waiting anxiously at the top of the stairs to go see presents. You can barely see Lydia and Nathan but they are in there.

We had our traditional Christmas breakfast of Toaster Strudel. We only have it once a year and have had the same breakfast for Christmas for the last 10 years - since Katie was 6 months old. We eat before opening presents.

Anna on her new bike:

Opening gifts.

I LOVE the interaction that took place right after this next picture. Michael gave Anna a nutcracker last year for Christmas. Anna loved it so much that she wanted to start a collection so this year Michael got her another one. When Anna saw it, she was totally amazed and had tears in her eyes and cradled it like a baby. She kept telling Michael she loved it and thanking him over and over. Michael was so happy and proud. That's the true meaning of Christmas right there!

Nathan gave Michael a shirt with about 500 numbers of Pi on it. Michael has a new obsession with memorizing the digits of pi. He can spout off about 72 digits in less than a minute and get them all right!

Elizabeth picked out her own gifts to give this year. For her birthday this year she got a cat and book from one of her grandmas. She loved it so much that she wanted to get similar stuffed animals and books for her sisters (you might recognize them Kohls).

Lydia gave Caleb a car puzzle that he LOVES.

Lydia made me a plate at school and was so happy to give it to me.

Nathan loving his new software for writing music (Print Music).

Caleb loved his car from Elizabeth and was done opening presents at that point because he needed to drive the car of course. We just left his under the tree for later and he "drove" all morning.

Lydia giving dad a present. She picked out a belt all on her own and was proud that she thought of it and got to pick it out. Dad is trying to figure out what it could be. He always tries to guess presents before he opens them.