A Very Merry Christmas!

This was by far in my opinion one of our best Christmas mornings we have had.  The boys are at such a fun age and were so excited about Christmas.  Andrew and Kate are at the age where everything is new and magical and exciting.  It also was considerably more peaceful than the past couple of years and with the exception of someone waking up around 11:30 Christmas Eve I actually got to sleep through the night. First Christmas since having kids that I can say that! 

Santa came!

James got a Lego set and a tennis racket.  H got a motorcycle, magna tiles and Santa found Ryan's old golf clubs and rehabbed them for him.  All four kids got monogrammed towels because he knew this mom was tired of her towels being taken! At our house Santa normally brings something you want, something you need and a surprise. 

Andrew got bubbles, play doh and a Mickey toy. Kate got chalk and some dress up clothes. 

We let the big boys come downstairs before we got A and K up which was definitely the right call

Band aids! Does anyone else have a kid with this obsession?!

James ended up doing this entire 1,400+ piece Lego set in two days almost completely by himself

Ryan caught me trying to capture the memories. It's hard because you want to watch everyone at the same time!

I still don't get this Pokemon obsession but this was the first present he asked for this year and he sure was thrilled to get it. 

We let the boys open one present before we did the rest with the whole family 

James immediately had to get his cards out

H immediately had to build some of his Lego set 

Finally time for A and K to join the fun!

I'll be honest, they were pretty ticked because they wanted breakfast first. 

After they saw their stockings and Santa gifts we had to break for a bowl of cereal.  #priorities

Finally present time!

My present from Harrison. Thank you preschool teachers!

Andrew and Kate finally understood what to do at this point

"It's mine!" 

I love that Kate went over to snuggle with Ryan 

"Thanks for my gift".  James got H a present from his school marketplace and H went shopping at the $ Tree :) 

I loved seeing how proud they were to give the gifts they had made and picked out 

The big hit was a dinosaur fossil you chop into pieces to find the hidden treasures. It was FREEZING outside but they had to go do it.  

After our monthly count down it was finally time to put baby Jesus in his manger and we realized he was missing.
Kate- "Where's the baby Jesus? I took him." Haha! He was later found in the playroom...

When we were done with presents Nene and Pappy showed up!

Just in time to watch the best part of Christmas morning- our yearly video that Ryan makes! 

He does an amazing job of capturing the highlights of our lives from that year.

Next we braved the cold to try out the motorcycle 

H gave J a chess set from the $ Tree and somehow Pappy got sucked into playing a game 

Trying out Nene's Christmas necklace 

All ready for brunch with the grandparents

My gift from Andrew 

And Kate

Once Nana and Pop arrived it was time for brunch.  Mimosas, yogurt parfaits, sausage egg casserole, and homemade cinnamon rolls.  

Yes we used paper plate.  I'm all about simplifying life right now and it sure made clean up faster! 

We even added Christmas sprinkles to the yogurt which was a big hit 

Love that tree topper 

Then the final gift of the morning 

What could it be? 

It's finally Harrison's turn to get to go! My mom and I are taking the boys to a quick Disney getaway in a couple of weeks.  For months Harrison would randomly ask "mommy do I ever get to have a turn to go to Disney world?" 

My favorite present by far this year was this beautiful piece of wood with our family mission statement printed on it.  For about a year Ryan and I have discussed what the purpose and mission of our family was.  We wanted a framework to base our decisions off of, to refer to throughout life, and to help guide us.  We discussed it quite a bit. What was important to each of us, what we desired for our family, what did we want our family to look like 5, 10, 30 years from now.  Ryan made a first draft (which I thought was too short), I added and made the second draft (he thought it was too long), and as a surprise he merged them together and had it printed and hung in in our kitchen.  I LOVE it!!!