Christmas Day!

Christmas this year was so much fun! Don't get me wrong, it's fun every year, but this year was different. Tol and Addi were super into it. Addison had a birthday earlier in the month and found a new love of opening presents. She likes the actual gift, too, but she LOVES ripping the wrapping paper into 8 million little pieces and moving onto the next one. Tol on the other hand, LOVES all the toys and CANDY. Santa hangs CANDY CANES all over the Christmas tree for the kids, and I seriously think that is Tol's favorite part (surprise, surprise!).


We left out some cookies, milk and an orange for Santa. Tolman also wrote a note and drew a picture of Santa for him as well. Don't the cookies look delicious? Tolman made them all by himself... with a tiny bit of help from Grammy Shar. Santa even left a note saying how YUMMY it all was after he gobbled everything up.

So here's what I don't understand: I heard Tol get up Christmas morning and run to the bathroom at about 7:30. I just layed in bed waiting for him to come in and get Dave and I out of bed when he was done. To my surprise, he went right back in his room and turned on a movie and waited until he heard Addi wake up (about 30 minutes later). Then he came into our room. Did he forget it was Christmas? Did he want to let Dave and me sleep? Whatever the reason, it was nice since Dave and I were up til 2:00 am putting the dang toy kitchen together. That thing was a BEAST!

Yay!!! Santa came and filled our stockings and left TONS of presents under the tree! I guess the kids were good all year after all.

After all our presents were opened, we headed to my parents house. When we opened the door to leave we were greeted by

Old Man Winter!


I have to say that I LOVED seeing this BEAUTIFUL sight when I pulled up to my parents house. It is Jess', Chel's and Nils' cars. I was so excited to see them because everyone was home for Christmas. I had to get a pic of it... plus I thought it was funny that all their wipers got blown into the upward position and got frozen there.

We opened our gifts and had a little devotional on Christ. I have to say that was one of my favorite parts of the day. It was so nice to focus solely on our Savior for a while when it is His birth we celebrate.

Poor little Addi fell asleep in the middle of all the unwrapped gifts and ripped up wrapping paper while the rest of us were enjoying my mom's homemade cranberry muffins (which, by the way, was Dave's VERY FAVORITE part of Christmas, "hands down"... really?). And the next pic is Dave and Tol in Chel's new kayak. In fact, Tol spent most of the day in that thing. He was super disappointed that he couldn't take a nap in it.

We ended up spending the whole day at my parents. We were actually kindof snowed in. Dave attempted to leave due to his urge to go driving in the crazy weather, but that was quickly put to an end when he got completely stuck in the alley-way behind my parents house. We tried to shovel him out. When that didn't work, a truck came and pulled him out. How was your drive, Dave?

The boys and Chel went to the church and played basketball while the rest of us slept and cooked. Erica flew in that day and My Grandparents braved the weather and drove out that night for a FABULOUS dinner. We sang Christmas songs around the piano and played games all night and it was a BLAST.

We had a WONDERFUL Christmas because we have so much to be thankful for and so much to celebrate!

Merry Christmas!!