Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas Morning Everyone!
After a rough go of it weatherwise yesterday, today has dawned sunny and bright...just as it should on Christmas morn!

Just a mere 24 hours ago, the world looked like this:


and the drive to Texarkana yesterday looked something like this:




But that didn't stop us! Even though the Chipmunk movie we wanted to see was sold out, we still made the best of it and spent some time together (the M&Ms and I that is...Trey stayed home to get some rest...altho I'm not sure how much rest one can get with a cellphone permanantly glued to your ear and a young lady on the other end).

After our excursion, we finished up or Oreo Balls, made Chex Mix, and got ready for the candlelight service at church. It was very nice! Then we took our traditional Christmas meal over to Greg's house and spent the evening frying and chocolate dipping bacon & wrapping presents. The kids chowed down on pretty much the same as last year (Trey requested chili-cheese dip again, Matt re-orderd shrimp cocktail, and Molly played hostess with the mostest armed with a can of squeezy cheese and a box of Ritz crackers!) but I added parmesan-garlic chicken nuggets and ham pickles to the menu to liven things up a bit!

Once things were all wrapped up (literally) over there, we journeyed back home...IN THE SNOW..(ok, so it was just flurries in a wintry mix..but it's the first time I'VE ever seen snow on Christmas Eve) and readied ourselves for Christmas Eve.

Matt read the Christmas story to us from Luke 2:


and then Molly said a Christmas prayer and I let them open 1 gift each....to start.



but then...I acquiesced and let them open all the gifts from under the tree and decided Santa would be enough for the morning. They readily agreed!

*Molly in her new jammies, opens up the movie "Imagine That". She wound up with "17 Again", too!


*Matthew anxiously awaits his turn....

NOW!


WHAT?? UNDERWEAR???


(I told them they were all getting socks and underwear. Since they needed them anyway, I just wrapped them up to give them more packages under the tree.)

oh yes..and the JoBro calendar..


*Maggie checks for any stray candy..


The kids went to bed pretty easily...Matt put in a new movie he got and he and Molly crashed in my room. Trey went to bed with his cell phone...and I heard him talking on it for hours!

Actually...I stayed up under the ruse of wrapping up the rest of Greg's gifts, which I really had to do, and "watching a movie to unwind". But within 20 minutes the M&Ms were asleep so Santa moved swiftly and was here and gone by 12:30am!

Holding them off this morning was the biggest challenge...4:00...5:15...by 6:30 Trey was even up, so off we went to the living room to see if we'd been on the naughty or nice list.

BOY DID WE FOOL SANTA! He not only put us on the Nice list..but he musta added gold stars by our names! The kids were ecstatic!!


Molly got her boots!


and a Nintendo DS with some games.

Matthew got the XBox 360 he'd been asking for on every bday and christmas for the past 3 years...



and Trey got a cool vertical cd player that you can plug an mp3 player into, too.



Santa was even good to Maggie!



By 7:00am they M&Ms were set and busy for the day...



and Trey even was able to get dressed in his new hat and shirt.


Maggie decided she'd had enough of this good time and was ready for a nap!


Now that it's 9:20am...breakfast has been eaten, the boys are doing their thing, and Molly is crashed out on my bed.
And I think I may go join her.

Merry Christmas to you one and all!! May the joy of the day be upon you and fill you with the blessings of the season!