Christmas Day 2013

The boys woke up at 6:15-ish and we gave them a bath and some yogurt smoothie before we went into the living room to open presents (they didn't have a bath last night--P.U.!).

The boys didn't really seem to understand the idea of opening presents.  And, Carlos had them open the Thomas presents first.  They got so excited about each Thomas present that then they didn't want to open anything else; they just wanted to play with the trains.  It was cute that they were so excited!

They quickly went crazy in the living room, too, moving from playing with Thomas to wanting to pull the wine bottles out of the bar so we moved most of the recently-unwrapped toys to the play area.

At around 9am, mom, dad, and Jim, Jen, and James came over for brunch.  We opened presents--I have no pictures because I was in the kitchen most of the time--and then ate around 10.   Then we went to the play room.  James had a great time eating the banana and crayons from these color sorting set.

As always, Sebastian had a good time trying to kiss poor Baby James, who was a good sport about it.

Carlos modeled his new slippers from last night's Yankee Trade...

The boys tried out and fought over their new balance bike.

And now they are napping.  After naps we are off to my dad's to open presents there and have dinner. Busy day!  I think we will need to make an early night of it because of the boys' sleep deprivation!  Back to the routine tomorrow, I hope!

And, we still have half the presents under the tree to open!  Maybe we'll open the rest of them tomorrow and give them 2 Christmas mornings.  It's only the small stuff left, but they don't really know any better...

Tomorrow and Friday Carlos is off.  The electrician will come tomorrow to fix the dishwasher situation.  I hope to do some post-holiday shopping.  I might want to buy another artificial tree for next year...I'd like one for the basement play area as well that we can decorate with all the sentimental ornaments we have.  I'd also like Christmas craft supplies.  It's hard to shop and accomplish anything with the boys, though.

Celebrating the holidays for the first time in our new house was a great experience.  I love this house and the space is great for the boys.  Plus, our living room is the perfect Christmas living room!  Santa seemed to like it...

Merry Christmas!!!!!!!!!!

Christmas Eve

The boys and I stayed in all Christmas Eve morning and played.  We had fun playing trains, watching a little Thomas, playing with the Little People, and reading.  I stuffed them full with fish sticks (their favorite--yuck) for lunch so that they would nap well.  And while they were down, I packed everything we'd need for the trip to Auntie Carol and "Kitchen's" house.

We got to Auntie Carol's around 3:30 and immediately set out to eat all the yummy appetizers.  The boys hung out with Grumpy.

The boys were fascinated with Kitchen's Lego City.  Christian was so patient with them, letting Sebastian play with his lego ambulance (with a man on a stretcher inside).  He also let them run the train.  They followed him around, particularly Sebastian--he has a man crush on his cousin.

Christian is SO good with the boys.  All day yesterday they kept saying "Kitchen 'ouse" over and over and over.

During and after dinner we had to break out the Thomas DVD.  It worked on Sebastian but not on Adrian.  He is super ADD and fussy lately.  Nothing makes him happy.

We did a Yankee Swap, but I forgot to take pictures.  I brought the same stuff I took to the Christmas party at Nick's: a big BJs bag of pistachios from Carlos with homemade salted caramel pretzel bark and Philosophy shampoo/bubble bath/shower gel and pretzel bark.  Plus each bag had photo ornaments of the boys.  Auntie Carol ended up with the Philosophy, and I am not sure who took home the pistachios!  I got white chocolate Godiva Liqueur and Carlos got slipper dusters and fuzzy women's socks.  hahaha!

After dinner we put the boys in their PJs.  We took some final photos with Kitchen.

We left Auntie Carol's around 7:30...Sebastian slept in the car after a while and Adrian was awake the whole ride home, so he didn't go to bed until around 9pm last night.  Given he hasn't been napping that well lately and is getting over a minor cold, I was afraid he'd be horrible Christmas morning.  He wasn't great, but he wasn't as bad as I'd feared.

Anyway, when we got home, Carlos and I made the brunch recipes for Christmas Day.  We made french toast casserole and sausage and egg casserole because they have to sit in the fridge over night.  You can get the recipes for these here--I make them often.

I should have edited this photo but forgot and now I am too lazy...

Finally, I took some pictures of what the living room looked like after Santa came and went to bed.  Phew!

This is all the loot from Christmas Eve at Auntie Carol's.  As always, she and Kitchen were extremely generous with their gifts to the boys.  We are lucky that Christian also loved Thomas!  ;-)

Merry Christmas Eve to all!