Christmas Morning - 2023

 Taken a few minutes before midnight on Christmas Eve as Mr. and Mrs. Claus headed into bed:

Now that the kids are a little older, they don't necessarily wake up before dawn on Christmas morning.  They ambled into our room around 7:30 am and after making some hot tea for me and coffee for Steve, we settled into the living room to see what gifts had been carefully chosen and wrapped for each of them.

The kids take turns opening one gift at a time so everyone is able to see the goods ... 

The coveted lip mask set that she had on her Christmas list"

The laundry baskets are used to load their individual gifts into after opening and it works out perfectly!

I do not know what all the rage is for these finger skateboards, but this was a big item on Jack's list and he was happy to receive them.

Sam loves statement earrings and received a whole set of them.

Sophia has quite the collection of sleep masks but many of them were getting old and ratty.  It was time for an update.

This is probably my most favorite thing: for the last several years, Santa has brought Jimmy a special stuffed hedgehog with a name tag on for his beloved hedgehog family.  It began after he acquired "Hedgie," at Hobby Lobby when he was little.  He took that hedgehog with him everywhere and still sleeps with it to this day.  

Then came Hedgie's mom, Holly ... followed by his dad named, "Harold;" the sister named "Hattie" and this year, Santa brought the grandpa named "Humphrey."

Samantha is a big fan of Taylor Swift and I found a beautiful blanket with details from all of her albums on it.  I also found some trumpet music for a few of her songs and that was a big hit with Sam since she plays trumpet in concert band, marching band and jazz band.

An action shot displaying how tidy they manage to keep the living room now while opening gifts.  It makes for a much smoother clean up afterwards when we are preparing for breakfast and to have guests over later.

One of Jimmy's favorite NFL players is Justin Jefferson and I found a print (and then framed it) for his room.  He was pretty excited about that.

The girls spent their own money and picked out gifts for Steve and me.  This picture made us laugh for SO long!  Steve loves eclectic socks and white sunglasses so Sam found a pair of each.  This chicken socks are the best ever!

Later, we had family over for spaghetti and meatballs, a big salad, garlic bread and dessert.  With no snow in the forecast and a high of 54 degrees on Christmas Day (!), the kids spent quite a bit of time outside and I'm pretty sure that it broke some high temp records for the holiday.