The Day We Celebrated Christmas!

Christmas is always such a wonderful day but with two sweet little girls, I can't think of anything that could make it better. The girls were both so excited when they got downstairs and saw all of their loot. Brooke was thrilled with her new baby and all the gear to go with it. She quickly named the baby Sydney after my good friend Bonnie's sweet baby girl. Katelyn was thrilled when she discovered that Santa brought her Pixos! She desperately wanted Aquadots last year until they got recalled. She was so excited that this year she "got the kind that won't kill you!"

Katelyn was also really excited when she opened the "school set" that Santa brought her. In included a new pointer (in blue this time), a Judy clock, report cards, grade book, hall pass and the mother of all calendars. Santa even had it laminated and put Velcro on all the little pieces. She loved it and has set up a wonderful preschool classroom in the playroom for Brooke.

They also loved the neat coloring sets and baby Cabbage Patch dolls they got from their cousin Calvin and Aunt Rani. They were having so much fun playing that opening presents didn't matter anymore so we took the first of several play breaks that involved having fun with toys and eating lots of warm cinnamon rolls.

When present opening resumed the girls continued enjoying themselves. Brooke kept exclaiming "OH MY GOSH!" "That is SO COOL!" and "I Love It!" each time she would see something new. She would also ask very politely for someone to "open please" each time she had something new to try out. Brooke's favorite present was the Brown Bear Brown Bear board book that Katelyn got for her. It's her favorite book but we don't let her take Katelyn's hardbound version to bed because she'd tear it, so she was thrilled to get a bedtime copy all her own.

When almost all the presents were opened, Katelyn started to look a little panicked. When we asked her what was wrong (and I already knew of course) she said in a quivering voice that it didn't look like any of the presents left could be a Barbie laptop. So we quickly grabbed a laptop-sized present from behind the recliner next to the tree. Her sweet little face lit up when she read, "To: Katelyn, From: Gram & Pop." She was so excited... Brooke was excited too and actually squealed"Barbie Laptop!" The bad part (as you can see in the picture below) was when she realized that it wasn't for her. Fortunately, Gram and Pop got her a laptop of her own and she loved that one too.

Even though we took our time and had lots of play breaks and food breaks, Brooke got tired enough that she tried to take a little "stair nap" and then she was ready to go again.

We relaxed and had a wonderful day that included lots of playing and awesome prime rib leftovers for lunch. I finally made the girls get out of their pajamas at about 4 o'clock so we could go over to the Albrecht's for Christmas dinner. They were not excited to get ready but they were thrilled we were going to spend the evening with our good friends. Before we left, I convinced the crew to take a few pictures in front of the tree.

We had a wonderful time celebrating with the Albrechts and their family that night. Brooke loved sitting with Tessa and the rest of the big kids during dinner. When it was movie time for the girls they couldn't decide which movie to watch, so Brooke was the tie-breaker. When Jessica asked her what show she wanted to watch she said in a crystal clear little Brookie voice "I want Frosty the Snowman." Suddenly the debate was over.

We had a wonderful day celebrating together and feel so blessed - we have such wonderful family and friends. We are grateful for all of you.

Here are two videos of some highlights from our day. (Disclaimer: this video was created for grandparents and really nice aunts, so we don't expect anyone else to actually make it through both videos)