Christmas Eve and Day were fairly quiet and relaxed here at home this year. We already had our Butterfield Christmas FHE with the Butterfields and Laverne was still keeping away from people because of her health situation and Grandma Norton has been in Utah since after Thanksgiving. So we opted to just stay home and do our own thing. In the late afternoon we watched a church video of the nativity and talked about it a little. We played Apples to Apples afterwards. We thought the ornament activity from the ward Christmas party was a fun idea so we bought some supplies to make our own and did that. Some kids would play video games while the rest of us worked on the craft. Then we would trade.
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| What they looked like when you first put them in. |
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| They melted pretty quick. |
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| And afterward. |
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| Alice made the most. The boys didn't really want to make one but we made them do at least one. |
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| Curtis is wearing his on his ear. Silly guy. I only made one because the girls kept needing my help. |
After our project was done, we spent some time cleaning up the house to get it looking nice for Santa. Then we opened Christmas pajamas. Well, they aren't actually Christmas pajamas, they are new pajamas you can wear all year. Curtis and Nikki both said they didn't want or need new jammies so they didn't get any but I had Nikki open mine for me because I did want new ones.
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| Getting ready to open the pjs! |
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| Wearing our new jammies! |
After we all got cozy in our pjs, we settled down to listen to Curtis read "The Night Before Christmas", as is our tradition. When the story was over we put on the movie "White Christmas". Jack decided he was going to skip the movie and go straight to bed. He was tired and still not 100 percent better yet. The movie was a good way to get Alice to fall asleep also. After the movie was over, Nikki and Garrett went to bed while Curtis, Charlotte and I played Santa. Yep, Charlotte found out the truth about Santa last spring when her friend at school kept saying he wasn't real, so we decided to go ahead and tell her. But that also meant she could be Santa's Helper (SH) this year and she enjoyed doing that, which meant she put Santa gifts out and helped with stockings, except her own.
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| Reading the story. |
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| Even Sage got cozy and fell asleep. She is so cute! |
Charlotte was up around 1a.m. or so and woke Alice up. She came into my room and said she couldn't sleep but I told her to go back to bed and try. She ended up crying in the hallway and I just did not want to take it. I got a little upset with both girls being up and threatened to wait until after church before opening presents if they got out of bed again. I was tired and had to wake up early so I could shower and get dressed before opening presents since we were going to church that morning and I needed to be there by 10am to warm up with the choir and sing prelude songs before the program at 10:30a.m. So, I didn't want to hear the kids all night and had to make that point known. Fortunately, that was the only time the girls came in, probably because I also locked my bedroom door after that and turned my fan up to high to drown out noise. But even after I got upset with the girls in the night they still woke up happy and excited. We started with opening stockings some time after 7a.m.
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| A men's grooming kit, orange, Reese's, a coin game that looks like corn hole, and some peanuts. |
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| Alice got new hair clips, stickers, a coloring squishy that can be washed and colored on again, peanuts, an orange, and bubblegum. |
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| Charlotte got pretty much the same as Alice. |
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| Jack got a men's grooming kit, a small game called chicken fling, an orange, peanuts, and Oreos. |
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| Nikki got a new razor (because she left hers here and I started using it, she asked about it when she came home). She also got an orange, peanuts, Nerds candy, and an ice sphere maker to make ice balls for her glass of water or drink. |
Then we had the kids hand out gifts to everyone. My in-laws came over just in time to watch us start opening presents. It was fun to have them there.
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| Alice got a walking unicorn from Santa. |
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| Charlotte got a small beginners sewing machine from Santa. |
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| Jack got a finger piano from Santa. |
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| Garrett also got a finger piano, painted dark blue. |
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| Nikki got a pillowcase that says "Call Mom" |
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| There's her mini sewing machine. I told you it was tiny! |
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| I found a fun puzzle box to stick a gift card in that you had to solve to get the gift card out. Nikki got it pretty quick. We gave her a gift card to Walmart since we know she's limited on space since she flew home with only one suitcase. |
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| All of Alice's loot. |
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| Charlotte's gifts. |
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| Nikki's gifts. She also got a Magpen, which is a pen that has magnets that you can take on and off and play with them. |
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| Jack's gifts. |
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| Garrett and Jack got similar gifts this year. |
After opening the gifts, we warmed up some monkey bread to eat for breakfast along with our goodies from our stockings. Then we had to get ready for church. Our Sacrament meeting was mostly musical, with narration in between and a few words from Bishop Roundy. I was happy that I was able to sing with the choir for Christmas. I hadn't done that since before the pandemic. The roads were very icy that morning so I wasn't sure we would be singing since some other stakes in Nampa cancelled church. East Stake did not though. That was my last time singing with this ward since we are moving soon and I enjoyed it. I was able to get a picture of our family after church. Garrett is always so quick to go change after church, that I had to make him change back into Sunday clothes. Nikki just wore her normal clothes to church but that's fine. We're just glad she came.
This is the first year that we did not go anywhere on Christmas, other than church. It was nice and relaxing and I loved spending time with our kids. With Christmas being on a Sunday, that meant no video games. Garrett and Jack bought each other games since they knew mom and dad weren't going to do it this year. They had to wait until Monday to get to play them. That made it easier for us to spend quality time together. We played some new games and Garrett and I did a puzzle together. One of the new games is called Throw Throw Burrito. It is a fun game that is basically a mix of Spoons and dodgeball. Nikki had gone to visit Ted for a bit but she played with us after she got back. For our Christmas dinner, Curtis cooked a new garlic chicken recipe and I made home made mac and cheese mixed with cut up meatballs and a little broccoli. It was good but I probably won't add broccoli next time. It just tastes better with out it, in my opinion. Alice wasn't happy about the broccoli either. She usually likes mac and cheese but she wouldn't touch it this time.
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| I was able to us my new tripod that I got for Christmas to take this picture. |
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| The boys playing with their finger pianos. They were learning how to play some tunes by ear. It was fun to listen to them. |
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| They did have a couple of songs that came with the pianos. |
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| Curtis got me a wearable blanket that is super soft and some fun wool socks. The puzzles are a family gift from Garrett. Curtis also got me the tripod for my cell phone. My in laws got us a pickle ball set and my parents got us some new silicone mats. I love all of my gifts and can't wait to use them! |
I wanted a picture of Curtis with his gifts but he was busy and then it didn't happen. I got him another new shirt for wearing to work, new church socks, and slippers. Jack got him a set from the movie Elf that included a mug, socks, and keychain.
We ended the night watching the 2nd episode of Season 3 of the Chosen. It was so good and a great way to end the Christmas day!
