Our Christmas

My Christmas started around 11:30 on Christmas Eve as Santa Claus was putting Bee's baby doll swing out and realized that the elves had forgotten to pack batteries for it in his sleigh!! What's a Christmas present if one cannot play with it on Christmas morning? So Santa scoured the entire house for toys that used "C" batteries, found that most batteries used in children's toys in this house use "AA" batteries. Finally Santa managed to scrounge 3 "C" batteries from the boys' toys without waking any children or a Grannie and Pa sleeping in the same room (although Grannie and Pa's black lab Jessie did get up to greet the Jolly Elf!! Santa had successfully put all presents in the living room by 1:30 a.m., said goonight to Smart Guy and myself and was off to the next house.

The kids were told they could not get up before 7:30, and that if they got up, saw it was 7:30, but it was still dark outside, they had to wait until it was light out. Prophet was apparently awake half the night waiting for 7:30, because that's when he showed up at my side of the bed announcing the time. Unfortunate for him, it's still pretty much dark at 7:30 here in the Eastern time zone, and since it was rainy and yucky it was completely dark. I told him to go back to his room for awhile. I laid there feeling totally guilty for about 10 minutes, then I got up and went downstairs to light some candles and put on Amy Grant's Christmas music (the best ever recorded as far as I'm concerned). By this time, it was light, so we got the camera and everyone tromped downstairs.

Prophet was crazy excited about his new gameboy, not even noticing that his pile looked miniscule compared to the other two. He opened the other presents only because he needed a game to play and hoped there was one in one of the other packages.

D.K. was equally pleased with his Imaginext Mega T-rex. This thing is freaky. It's entire neck swings around, it's eyes light up, and it roars when you push a button on it's back. After all was opened, he brought down the rest of his Imaginext dinosaur collection, which now numbers in the teens and played with them all day, occasionally taking breaks to peak over Prophet's shoulder to watch his game in progress.

Bee has loved playing with her new talking baby doll and Graco baby swing. The swing is so cool. It looks like the real thing. It's metal with an open top and it runs on batteries. I want one!! My grandma was very impressed with her new baby too when she came over.

We made Pillsbury cinnamon rolls for breakfast this year. Usually we make a big breakfast, but we just had a big breakfast with everyone at Mom and Dad's on Saturday morning, we were having a big lunch, and I havn't been feeling great for two weeks now, so I opted for easy. We also had apples and bananas just so I could feel better about it.

We let the kids stay in the jammies all day. I didn't even comb their hair. Bee did eventually get dressed. She came down in a pink flowered turtleneck, pink shorts, and bright Santa Claus socks. It was great!!

Lunch went great. We had pork tenderloin cooked with carrots and onions, mashed potatoes and gravy, and Beef House rolls!! mmmmm yummy!! For dessert there was pumpkin, praline, cream chess pie, strawberry pretzel salad, and all kinds of goodies people had sent home from church!!

Mom and I played Mancala several times. I wish I could say I wooped her butt, but I think we were about equal. We usually sit and snack while we're playing, so right before we sat down to play, I opened a bag of shrimp that we had thawed and arranged them on a heart-shaped dish with a little bowl of cocktail sauce for everyone to eat. There was also an entire loaf, minus 3 slices or so of pumpkin bread sitting on the counter. While we were all occupied with other things, my precious little sister, also known as Jessie the neurotic black lab, went into the kitchen, propped her front feet up on the kitchen island and helped herself to an entire loaf of pumpkin bread and about 30 shrimp. We'd been careful with the food all day, because Jessie has always been bad about getting food off the counter. She loves butter and has been known to eat an entire stick. One Halloween, she ate all the boys candy, wrappers, sticks, chocolate, and all. We called the vet, they laughed and said she'd probably puke all the wrappers and sticks up, but she'd be fine. Milk chocolate is apparently fine for dogs, it's the dark and baker's stuff that dangerous. So, anyway, Jessie-girl was on our poop-list for the rest of the day... poor baby. The thing about Labs is that they're smart and they know when you're mad at them, she moped around for quite awhile.

All in all it was a good day. Fairly calm for the most part. We ate, we rested, we talked, we played, we just had fun being together. We were all up until 11:00 last night, even the kids, so we're all tired today, but I've got laundry and packing to get done because we leave for WV to go to Smart Guys parents tomorrow morning at 8:00. I don't know if I'll be able to post while we're there, it's gonna be crowded. There will be 6 adults, 6 kids, a dog, and a cat staying in a not so big house. Could be interesting. On Thursday we will have the family Christmas blow-out with the entire family. My father-in-law is one of ten kids so Smart Guy has cousins crawling out of the woodwork at family things. I can't wait, it's so much fun!! I'll post if I can, but don't hold your breath!!

See y'all later!! Have a wonderful week!!