Christmas day is here...

We had a bit simpler Christmas prep/activities this year, but it was still wonderful! We made it to the Festival of Lights in Spanish Fork this year, which was an adventure. We had a kid carsick and throw up on our way there last year (yes, even though it's only 10 minutes away), so we insisted everyone come along (soccer events seem to be the only thing the teen is willing to go to) and pulled into a huge long line Saturday night before Christmas. We spent about an hour waiting in the car, inching along, eating some treats we'd brought along, singing some Christmas songs, which took up about 15 minutes, and endured a lot of confined-car-contention, and Aubree repeatedly complaining she needed a drink. Once we got into the lights, the drink was forgottten and we heard lots of oohs and aahhs from us and the girls. Aubree was delighted with everything, and her enthusiasm was contagious. Grace liked the ballerina and the frog jumping into the ponds, and the huge fingerbread house, Reese liked the giant serpent in the water, Aubree loved the castle.
Christmas Eve services on Sunday were great, and we enjoyed our traditional fish/bread dinner. But we forgot the dates in the pantry, but I guess no one missed them. The girls went to sleep surprisingly quickly, but made up for it by waking up at 5am. That's too early, especially for me when I'm pregnant, so we were prepared with a Christmas movie for them to watch upstairs with the boys. The boys weren't so happy about being woken up so early, but were up and anxious way before we were. This was also the first year they didn't rush down the stairs, and the teen bothered to do his hair before coming down! I guess they did have lots of time to kill.
I gave up trying to have them eat breakfast before opening presents, and my cinnamon rolls were mostly ignored. We hand out the presents and then take turns opening our gifts, and there were some comments about how Reese, Cameron and Grace didn't get any presents from RD and I, but there were a few to all of them from us. Reese told me later he thought he knew what it was when that happened, but tried not to get his hopes up too high. He, and the other two, were very excited he was right when they all opened it up.

We completely enjoyed the day day eating too many treats, playing games, and these four especially liked getting to play some new video games.

We also had woken up to some great snow, so the younger three all got out there making snowmen and snow angels. Padfoot's even left them alone, so we have a few skeletons still.

We made a delicious dinner, and spent the next few days in the same routine of games, snow and sledding, and treats. Aubree loves playing "Horseland" even more now with her new horse/barn and doll, and RD's spent a lot of time as Bobby :) That's probably the only thing he may not miss going back to work tomorrow. I admit I'm not too disappointed I'm not deemed worthy enough to play.

Sadly the snow melted in the next couple days, but the kids were excited to visit Grandpa and Grandma Packard and find out they had snow! Grandma and Grandpa are always fun to hang out with, and Grandpa set up a track for them to get a sled ride in the backyard, which they LOVE. Reese ended up sick while we were there, we always seem to have one sick kiddo there, sorry Grandma and Grandpa!