Oh what joy...

new Christmas jammies
The Lego chaos began
Spiderman with his very favorite, RC car
Christmas is exhausting! Who needs a nap?

The kids loved this fun gift from Aunt Susie and it filled up our afternoon yesterday.
excitement!

The Lego store moves into our home - or so it seems

The precious baby Becky gets a new outfit
she's got personality Goose was inspired to give Santa a little advice

As you can imagine, it was an exciting holiday at our house. For the last 3 years, we have eaten a traditional Guatemalan tamale dinner to celebrate Christmas Eve. NO MORE. None of the kids were thrilled to eat them and our Guatemalan "princess" was sobbing in her room because she didn't even want to try them (yes, we required it). That is not worth it! Well, after dinner we had our traditional birthday party for baby Jesus followed by reading the Christmas story. Jaybird did the honors and read it to us for his first time, precious! Then, they get to open Aunt Susie's gifts - new jammies to wear for Christmas (I love family traditions). You could feel the anticipation at bedtime and Goose penned her last minute message to Santa.

Despite going over the "rules" of Christmas morning last night, Spiderman still ran into my room at 6:23 AM today and asked, "Mom, can I go get my stocking?" Please, go, just let us sleep!! By the time all were up and fed (yes Mom, we still do the poptarts in our stockings for early feeders, just like when we were kids), they were ready to dig in to the tree. As you can see by the plethera of photos above, they were very pleased with their gifts. Thanks family, for all your gifts which added to the fun. Spiderman said (more than once), "there is no Christmas in Ethiopia". What a bittersweet comment to think he's never had a Christmas gift before but also to think, we overdo so much in America. While they do celebrate the holiday, it certainly isn't anything like what we do here in the States. May we truly be thankful for the real reason of the season and not get caught up in what we did or did not receive this Christmas. I'm reminded that there are still so many children in the world who long for a meal, a hug, or a family. We are all so very blessed.