Merry Christmas, One and All!

We had a very Merry Christmas! Santa came despite our calls informing him of the behavior issues! I think he must get calls from every parent around this time of year about their children misbehaving! ;) We had lots of fun, and spent a nice sunny day out in the culdesac with our neighborhood friends!


The kids got 3 things of their own from Santa, plus a church outfit. In Lexi's pile we found roller skates, a ginormous Tinker Bell art set, and a Skitter. In Braeden's pile there was a Nerf gun game, complete with glasses, 2 huge guns, all the ammo, and vests for keeping points, a remote control car that is very speedy, and a skitter. Ella found a cleaning trolley with a vacuum that actually turns on (plus all the other accessories :) She's our own little maid! Ha!), a bouncy, spinny zebra thing that sings and makes lots of noise, and a skitter! Then Santa brought us some family gifts... like the one you see above. It's an art center with a white board that is magnetized, a chalk board, and then the other side has a little desk with calendar stuff on it! It's been fun for the kids! He also brought us a slew of movies, some puzzles, and the HIT was the Wii! We have to admit that even though we haven't played it too much, it is a very fun thing to have, and even Ella can bowl! It's pretty funny!

Santa brought Damian a fancy new BBQ, a boogie board, and he got an annual membership to an indoor go-karting place! Fun stuff!

The suspense is killing them all!

YESSSSS!

Now you know what all the fuss was about!

Ella was totally into it for a while... but she had a limit... and she hit it before she had opened everything! But I have to say that she was so totally excited about the soccer ball and the baby accessory backpack that she got from Jonathan! She hasn't left home without that backpack for a couple of weeks... sigh!

And Braeden was equally excited about his new football from Caroline! She also got him a mini Megatron... which is perfect! Keep the bad side small and they're easier to capture and torture!

Lexi just loves the new TREASURE BOX full of dress-ups! That came from Hayden. All these were from drawing names in Damian's family! Fun stuff!

Gma Pam got Braeden a Bumblebee helmet that makes noise, sings, and has a voice mixer in it! Pretty cool! And it's so funny to watch him with it on... it's very large! And he actually does look much like a bee!

I am here wondering how on earth we are going to clean up all this stuff, but if you look closely you can see Lexi's new dress on the couch, the BBQ, and Ella's zebra and cleaning equipment!

There was no wasting time in trying to get these things on! She couldn't even wait until she got off the phone!

And... she's off!

I don't know where she thinks she was going... there was absolutely NO SPACE on the floor to do anything, much less roller skate! ;)

This is what the skitter is... a ride-on toy that belongs outside, but Ella got it going pretty good in the kitchen after she was shown what to do!

Already hard at work on our artistic abilities!

And Ella's just on the other side with more stuff!

This is where it gets scary! It makes my chest hurt when I see her try to take off going down hill... especially since she's not the most graceful thing there ever was! I just know she's going to eat it hard one of these times!

But... she didn't get far! This is about 3 feet out of the garage, and already she didn't have steering control! ;)

These, however, need to be ridden only with shoes ON!

Here's why! Ouch!

Kids come up with the craziest stuff! And we have so much fun around here! I'm so glad to live where we do!

Get the full picture now!??! They would ride them all the way down the street, then Giana would hook her arms in the middle to Makayla and Lexi, and Gyatri would push them all back up the street on her blades! Crazy girls! You can better appreciate how much fun they were having by watching the video below!

Look at the very top of the picture! He has a better spiral than Damian!

All in all... we had a great day and hope that you did, too! We decided that we might send out St. Patrick's Day cards this year! We didn't get them done, obviously, and Damian must feel like St. Patrick's Day doesn't get enough attention, because that was his idea! Ha! We'll see!

We hope that your new year is filled with joy and happiness! We're so grateful always for all of you!
Happy New Year!