December Daily {25th}: Christmas!

Zac and I got up at 7:00 this morning and got ready to wake the boys up.  Of course it was the one morning Beckham looked as if he'd just sleep & sleep all morning! (:  We went in and shook Grayson a little.  I said, "It's Christmas!  Want to see if Santa came?!"  He said okay in a groggy voice & we told him to wait with us while I got Beckham up.  He was still sleepy, but Zac was videotaping everything and we all made our way into the living room.  I can't even describe the excitement.  It was totally awesome.  As if we were seriously experiencing Christmas through our kids eyes again.  Grayson was just in awe that the cookies & milk were gone & that Santa had left him a letter.  The first thing out of his mouth was, "Santa did come!  And he was so quiet I didn't even hear him!"  He couldn't decide whether to look at the Santa gifts (we kept them unwrapped in front of the tree) or the stockings filled on the couch.  We decided to do stockings first & he was just incredibly excited at each little dollar store trinket & toy.  He opened Beckham's for him-who by then was crawling around like a mad man & babbling his best Christmas present "Dada, dada" everywhere he went.

We did the Santa gifts next & they loved them and then opened presents.  We all felt spoiled & honestly it was so much more about the kids & the Savior this year than the gifts for me.  I just felt grateful to have the people I care most about in the world with me all day and to be blessed enough to be in the place we're at right now.  Grayson's favorite gift was the big Buzz Lightyear & the nerf guns for him & Zac and he kept commenting that "Santa did know what I wanted, huh Mom?!"  It was a very fun 45 minutes & then we headed over to G&G Pete's.  Sweet McCall is such a sport to wait for all the siblings & their kids to get there.  She never acts shafted that she shares her individual Christmas with the marrieds & the grandkids & I love her for this.

Anyway, we got there and had family prayer and then had breakfast after Gray & Jaeger opened the Santa gift which was a huge firehouse/police station for the boys to play with.  They were pretty excited & it didn't even get out of the box all day!  I made monkey bread but it totally bombed.  I followed the recipe exactly, but the top was too done and the middle & bottom weren't done enough.  Oh well-it tasted good in theory. (:  After breakfast {don't worry-they had lots of other choices}, we sat down for the sibling gift exchange.  Everyone took turns & we had fun laughing & enjoying what each other got.  Zac scored a gift card from Doll along with some crafting things {a little joke} and I got a great Ninja blender from Lancey.  Grayson got to open a complimentary Woody doll to go along with his Buzz & Beckham & Jaeger got matching rocking Bullseye's.  Next my cute mom went with a Toy Story theme & had each of us open a gift individually at this point.  I went first and it was a My Little pony set!  Totally one of my favorite toys from my childhood.  Zac's was Star Wars figurines-his all time favorite!  Talon got mighty machines, Taylor got bitty baby clothes, Lance got Legos, Kelsey got princess barbies, and Doll got american girl stuff.  She said Toy Story inspired her to find the child within and she wanted all her kids to have a reminder of their childhood & the toys they loved.  We were all seriously giddy.  I loved the item, but more than that I loved the thought that went into those gifts.  And, having something pink in this all boy house is kinda fun too.  So thoughtful & fun.

Dad had a surprise up his sleeve too though.  He brought in two boxes & told me I would be representing all the kids by opening it (meaning we were each getting one, but I was the only one opening it).  It was a Bosch with the food processor attachment!  Totally excited!  My mom didn't even know about that, so that was kinda fun too!  She got great gifts from my dad as usual-including the bosch, but each year she has the hardest time surprising him with something.  He always buys what she gets him beforehand or finds out what she's doing & isn't surprised.  Besides that, he just loves giving gifts so much more than receiving them that he has a hard time accepting things sometimes. (:  This year though, she stumped him.  And, it was an awesome gift.  She got him a trip to Vegas to take a class at a driving course & then he gets to drive an exotic car around the raceway 5-10 times!  I think Zac about fell over because he has honestly told me this exact gift is on his dream list.  He was so excited for my dad too because he's quite the car lover, himself.

 At this point we were all feeling incredibly spoiled & blessed and had laughed a ton at all the not-meaning-to-but-coming-out-anyway comments going on and then the stockings came out.  My mom is and has always been the "stocking queen."  She thinks of the most fun & unexpected things to put in the stocking.  Gray helped us & loved it and we all enjoyed our stockings a ton.  Thank you!  We cleaned everything up and were starting to get ready for lunch at the grandparents house when Dad said there was one more gift for Doll out in the trailer & he asked the three guys to go get it because it was kind of heavy.  They went out & came back in with a great long storage seat to put in her room with a plane ticket inside for her to fly to Portland tomorrow to stay with our cousin Cait.  She started crying she was so happy & then I started crying because I always do if anyone else does, and everyone was so happy for her!  Then Dad said they forgot something else & us girls better go help the guys get it.  We went out to the trailer & there were a bunch of different big gifts that were covered up with our names on them.  Well guess what was under our name??  A new couch!  Taylor & Talon had offered to buy our couch because they wanted it and we told them if they'd pay the cleaning fee to have it cleaned, they could just have it.  Then we started thinking that we better find a couch, so we've been looking online & on Craigslist, but hadn't decided on anything yet.  It is awesome.  We are totally in love.

 Everyone got something they'd been wanting that they didn't expect and it was just such a fun surprise & so like my generous & good parents.  I realized this Christmas more than ever before the joy you feel when you're giving to your kids.  We love the gifts & appreciate the material things-oftentimes without their help, we'd be nowhere near the place we are now-but more than that, we love the lessons we are learning from them.  And the teaching that the stuff is nice, but in the end it doesn't matter.  Family does.  Memories do.  Love does.  And most importantly, Christ does.  He is the reason we celebrate & my parents are so like Him in so many ways.  They truly take more joy in serving others than in anything else.  They are examples of Him and of pure love in every way.  Thank you Mom & Dad for making this Christmas the most memorable one yet.  Not because of the gifts-although we love them & will enjoy them every day for years to come-but because it felt so relaxed & real, so focused on our family, and you helped us center in on our inner child so we could really appreciate that full spirit of Christmas again for the whole day.  We love you & want to be like you when we grow up!

After that exciting climax, we headed to my dad's parents for lunch.  My mom's folks also came so it was nice to see the grandparents and have the boys get to love on them as well.  Dad had smoked a great roast & everything was delicious.  We enjoyed chatting and watching the boys play with Grandpa Popeye's railroad & trains and then headed our separate ways.  The guys went around delivering the big gifts & taking our old couch away and when Zac got home, he and Beckham took a long nap while Grayson and I unpacked, put away, cleaned, played, and relaxed.  We had Toy Story 3 playing and just talked about Gray's favorite parts of the day.  Lance & Kels stopped by for a few minutes in the evening and so did T&T and then we were alone.  Both boys were exhausted and in bed right after 8 so Zac and I spent time reminiscing about Christmas and talking about each one.  So grateful for this day.  So grateful for families, the gospel, my sweet husband, and my beautiful boys.  Each of these things & people bless me daily & that is the greatest gift. {lots more pics from mom's camera to be added later}