Christmas Day

My son is 9 years old soon to be 10. I can't believe how time flies. This year Hunter asked Santa for a BB Gun OR the Skylander's game with figures for the WII. I prefer that Santa bring my children NON electronic toys. This left us with the BB Gun. Being only 9 I was not/am not ready to have my child have a gun. Hunter is a responsible kid and I trust him to use his head around guns but really???? Just not ready. After talking to my mom who informed me both my brother's received their bb guns around the same age and many friends and other family member's received their bb guns at this same age I relented  and told Santa the BB Gun would be fine. Despite his silly look he was beyond thrilled with this gift. He knew I was against it and really didn't think he'd get this.  

 Over the past few months Brayden has discovered Super Heroes. His favorite is Spider Man and Captain America. He told Santa all he wanted was a Spider Man house. Despite his face he was thrilled. He loved this new toy so much that he refused to open any other gifts until later that day when was done playing with this one.

 Santa won the heart of Emily this year. All she wanted was her very own camera. I kept telling her that I didn't think she was old enough to have her own camera. She begged me over and over to tell Santa when he called that it was O.K for her to have her very own camera. I never would tell her what I told Santa so she was thrilled to see this.

 Madelyn still recovering from her tonsillectomy was pleased to see that Santa brought her what she asked for too.

 Miss Kylie slept beyond the 6:30 am wake up call the rest of us had so opened her gifts a little later. Santa brought her, her very 1st baby doll! This year when our kiddo's exchanged names with each other we decided that our theme this year was homemade gifts (last year was food storage). Hunter drew out Kylie's name and with some help he decided to make her some towel bibs. I drew the circle on the towel to be cut out and helped him pin the ribbing but he did the rest with me watching over his shoulder. He did a great job!  Mom and Dad gave Kylie a few new toys and slipper's. I

 Each year I try to make my kids some sort of a homemade gift. As they get older it has become more and more difficult. Sometimes I succeed and well.... sometimes I don't. This year I succeeded with her and was able to made an indoor hop scotch. Being it's been in the 20-35 degree weather lately this has been a great indoor energy release. All Madelyn wanted this year was more baking stuff. So I filled a box with more cake mixes, brownie mixes, muffin pouches, frosting, sprinkles and the such. We also gave her some more drawing/crafty fashion books. Brayden drew his big sister's name and I helped him make her some new bracelets for his homemade gift.

 Brayden this year was pretty easy for us. We gave him more puzzles. I made him a homemade gift which was the super hero cape with mask. One side is Superman and the other Captain America. Madelyn had Brayden this year and decided to make him some more play dough which is something he really enjoys playing with.

 Emily scored this year according to her pictures. Santa brought the girls several years ago a Barbie house and asked mom to provide the furniture. I made the majority of it using cardboard boxes and the such. After several years of abuse the furniture was needing to be replaced. So... wanting the furniture to last a bit longer this time I bit the bullet and scored a few deals when it came to the barbie furniture.  I was going to make Emily some dress ups as her homemade gift from me but in the end I took advantage of some 80-90% off Halloween costumes instead. Kylie drew Emily's name to exchange this year so Mom helped out by making Emily some LPS necklaces.

Hunter this year was quite difficult. He will soon be 10 and wanted expensive electronics along with most of his friends. You know things like his very own Ipod or the newest WII system, an X Box 360 or a DS. All things that weren't exactly on mom and dad's list. My brother in law several weeks ago taught him how to play Battleship. This is all he's talked about. Now he has his own and mom and dad have tried to play the game every time we've been asked. Hunter also read the Percy Jackson series and LOVED it! The library has had a hard time keeping the next little series that goes along with it on their shelves. So... we gave him that too. What kind of a homemade gift can you get a 9 year old boy???  I was able to come up with something after all. We bought him a football and then I made 10 belts and 10 blue/red pieces of fabric that attached to the belts for his own game of flag football. He was a bit disappointed  that we couldn't go out and play in the 2 feet of snow we've got but we were able to play a good game later that weekend with several Aunts, Uncles, Grandpa and cousins down in Hurricane. Emily drew Hunter's name and was able to talk her dad into helping her build him a night stand to hold all his books that were currently all over his dresser and pushed under his bed. He was thrilled and Emily was thrilled to spend some alone time with her dad building this together.

Emily was having a hard time figuring out her new camera so big sister sat and helped her figure it out. I love their looks of concentration. 

 Emily loved her new dress ups. All day long every time we saw her she was dressed up as something new. This was her favorite dress to wear.

 I think Kylie enjoyed the extra love and attention she received. We stayed in our P.J's almost the whole day (something we never do) and just played and played and played.

At the beginning of Christmas week we thought we would have most of Kory's sibling's over for a big dinner and a few other families that weren't able to make it home this year. We were expecting a total of 9 families. Christmas Eve, thanks to some major sickness going around we were down to 5 families. About an hour before our big dinner the phone began to ring and we learned the sickness had spread. In the end it was just us and Kory's sister, Harmony's family. We had PLENTY of food that lasted several day's but it was a great day. After dinner we sent the little kids upstairs to play and set up an extra table for the bigger kids. The adults played games on one table and the bigger kids played games on the other table. We had a great time.