Christmas

Hopefully everybody had a great Christmas just as we did! It was a long day filled with lots of family and fun. Once again I took way too many pictures to post on here so I created a Christmas 2009 photo album for you to enjoy. Throughout the post you will see some links which are just certain pictures that are in this album. You can either click on the link to go straight to that particular picture or click the album link to see all of the pictures.

Our day started with waking up around 7am. We brought the boys downstairs to the living room where all of the gifts were out under (and around) the tree. Zak had a blast, once again, unwrapping gifts while Ryder was doing well opening the gifts in bags. But when they opened up a bag from my mom (Grammy as they call her) it all went south (for us at least). They fell in love with this ball popper thing and refused to open any more gifts! Finally, Ben was able to take the ball thingy and hide them so we could get their attention back on the gifts that needed to be unwrapped. After about 80% of the gifts were opened they lost interest in the unwrapping and wanted to play with their new toys. Ben and I "helped" them unwrap the last few gifts and then started the task of taking their toys out of the boxes for them to play with. (Kids toys are so HARD to get out of the boxes, it is crazy!!)

Some of the gifts they unwrapped here at home included Harley Davidson scooters, Barney stuffed animals (from Santa), train set (from my mom), Busy Gears (from Grandma Mary in FL), electronic drum, DVD player (from my mom), Mr. Potato Head (from Saba Tim & Grandma Peg in NH), military play set, Nerf guns, and various movies from Saba Tim & Grandma Peg. Of course, they got tons of other gifts which I am not going to name one by one!

After the boys were able to play with their new toys for a bit we got in the car and headed into Annapolis for the day. We got to Colleen's house around noon. Madelyn and Chelley were there when we got to the house so we gave them gifts that Maddie got to open and then they headed home for nap time. Then the boys got to open gifts from Colleen and the kids (airport set, power saw, power screwdriver). Along with gifts from Natalie and Roy which included scarfs (Natty made herself), basketball game, and Paul Frank shirts (I love them!). After all of the gifts were open the boys enjoyed playing with Jamison and Josephine for a while. Then we left their house and headed to Chelley's apartment so the boys could open gifts from her. Zak opened the gifts while Ryder played with all of Madelyn's toys! Chelley was very excited about one of her gifts to the boys, but had my scared because she wanted them to open it before we went to our grandparent's house. Well, this gift was a foam sword and shield set. The boys LOVE it and I am fearing what damage they will do with it!

We got to my grandparent's house around 4:30pm and had dinner with them along with my aunt, uncle, and cousin. During dinner the boys started to misbehave, but we were expecting it since it had been a LONG day. After finishing dinner we went to the basement to open gifts from them. As soon as the boys walked down the stairs they spotted one of the gifts from my grandparents which was all set up and ready to play with....Neo Tracks cars. The boys had a blast with this, but Ben & John had a few times they needed to move the couch to find the run away cars! They also got a GeoTrax train and a fold-out couch. My aunt and uncle give them some clothes (very cute), Play-Doh, and some trucks. Ryder enjoyed playing with the big train set up around the tree which turned into a lot of work for my grandfather since it was knocked off the track frequently. Around 8pm we started to load the car up and head home since it is about an hour drive.

We got home a little after 9pm. The boys had fallen asleep in the car, but stayed asleep while we brought them into the house and put them in their beds. It was a very long day, but we had fun and the boys got TONS of new toys!