Christmas!

I'm late on the Christmas blog...sorry. My family has the tradition of starting Christmas morning opening stockings and then we have breakfast. After a nice, hot, wonderful breakfast, my dad will break out the first present and and the first recipient will then choose a package to give to another person. And the line continues like that until all the gifts are gone. Generally there are two or three sanity breaks as everyone enjoys a toy, goes to the bathroom or grabs a snack. By the time we are done, everyone is exhausted and ready for some down time. One especially big year we didn't get done opening presents until around 1 in the afternoon! This year we were done more around 1030-11, I didn't check the clock. This year was also much different than before. In the previous years, we've either had really little babies or young toddlers or no young childeren at all. This year there was a 5 yr old, a 2 yr old, a 1.5 year old and a 9 month old. The littlest slept most of the time, Emmaline took a good nap in the middle but the two oldest were really excited and often, the 2 year old would open random presents that she could sneek when Grandpa wasn't looking! Although there was quite a bit more chaos this year, I enjoyed it a lot. I felt like I was finally an adult, enjoying watching other people open their gifts. Its a step up from being an 'adult' but still wishing you'll be the next to recieve a package :) As for the gifts we got, we got a few board games, a new really good smelling candle, books for both of us, and other odds and end gifts. I don't think there was any one really big gift this year. Emmaline got an instrument set. All the instruments fit within a drum and there is a maracha, tamborine, xylophone, and bells. She really enjoys making all the noise. She also got the little people farmyard and house with a lot of the little people. The most unfortunate part is that I just realized that IF we got any pictures, they are all on my parent's camera. And I cant guarantee there are any. My trip to WA is next week. The plane will be an adventure. I'm sure I'll write all about it.