Christmas!

I remember when I was a kid getting so excited about Santa. My brother and I would sleep in the same room where we would plan out all night how to catch Santa (my brother even set up an electric alarm one year)...that is until we would accidentally fall asleep. We would wake up in the morning and go to my parents room as early as 4:00AM. My parents would then tell us to go to bed and come back later. We would come back but it was usually at 4:10...4:15...4:20...4:30 etc until they would finally get up.
My kids - NOT like me. They fell asleep fast on Christmas Eve. Christmas morning Kaiya and Ava woke up around 8:15, went to the bathroom and then went and played in the playroom. Ella was still asleep. There was no begging to go out to the Christmas tree. I was the one begging Cirdan to wake up Ella. He finally gave in and we all went to wake up Ella.

The girls walked out while Cirdan video taped and I took pictures. They opened up stockings then presents under the tree.

Our princess not wanting to wake up...

Their first reactions are the best!

The thing that Kaiya wanted most for Christmas was...A Coconut!!!

Momma's present...

Ella and Ava both got a Nintendo DS. They were really happy about it!!

After we opened present we headed over to my parents house for some brunch, to hang out with the family and more gifts. My brother got XBox Kinnect for Christmas and we had our Wii there so there was some video gaming going on. After visiting for a while we came home to clean up a bit and relax.

Kaiya was sooooo excited for Cirdan to open up her coconut. I am not sure what she expected. She asked for the same thing when she was 5. She forgot how much she didn't like it. She spit out the coconut water and choked down a piece of coconut. Merry Christmas Kaiya!

This was one of her grossed out faces. Silly girl.

Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve morning we hung around the house. Kaiya went to her dad's house for a few hours to have Christmas with him. Ella and Ava put together a fun puzzle they got from Grandma and Grandpa Imbler.



Ava wanted to take a bunch of pictures with Jett. Here are just a few.

The girls showing off their Christmas nails.

They watched a movie...

That night we went to my parents house.

My mom bought Kaylee a plane ticket to come home on Christmas Eve a couple months before. She surprisingly told me (the big mouth of the family) about her plan to surprise my dad. We came up with some fun ideas...have her sleep under the tree, have her sleep on the couch next to the tree or have her in a wrapped box for when my dad woke up and went out to the living room. As we were talking about who would dress up as Santa for our Christmas Eve party it occurred to me that it would be PERFECT for Kaylee to be Santa!
Fast Forward to Christmas Eve...my mom picked up Kaylee from the airport when she got off work and took her home to hide in the room downstairs. As soon as everyone got to my parents house my mom gathered everyone upstairs. I was texting Kaylee letting her know when Santa should arrive. After we said the prayer my mom said,"what is that I hear??" It was Kaylee coming up the back stairs with bells. My mom let her in the sliding door. Everyone was surprised and didn't expect it. She started talking in her Santa voice and soon after that my dad realized who it was. He looked at my mom shocked and started to cry a bit. It was a really cool moment. Kaylee brought some coloring books in her bag for the kids. No one else still knew it was Kaylee. After about 5 minutes or so I could tell Kaylee was getting uncomfortable. I asked Stacey and Cirdan if they knew who it was and they didn't. I then told Kaylee to reveal herself and she took off her beard and hat. Everyone was shocked!!! Kaiya was especially excited and ran up to her and gave her a big hug.

It was an awesome experience. It made our Christmas Eve a memorable one for sure!!

*my Grandma also knew what the plan was with Kaylee so her and Brad was also there.

My dad told us the story of Jesus. The real reason we celebrate Christmas. The kids acted the story out.

Amy played the part of Mary pregnant and Nathan was her donkey.

We skyped with Cirdan's family. They had a family party that night also. It was really fun to see everyone!!!

We came home...took some pictures and got ready for Santa to come to our house! The girls had drawn and wrote letters to Santa which we left out with his cookies and milk. The kids went to sleep soon after excited for what the morning would bring.