Joy to the World

We had a fun, family filled day of presents, presents, presents, and food, food, food. Avery woke up for the second time at 5:45am, so her and I climbed into bed with Brad and Riley until about 7:30am when Olivia woke up and then we all piled into our bed to watch Dora until the rest of the family arrived (My Parents and Aunt and Uncle) around 8am. Brad made his way downstairs to greet our guests and I brought the girls down, its important to us that the girls see the tree and presents for the first time when everything is ready, the lights are on and Brad is in place with the camera. We figured this year might be a little overwhelming for Olivia, and sure enough it was, but it didn't take her long to warm up.

As she rounded the corner and made her way down the stairs she was greeted by 4 grown ups staring at her, which for many children is scary enough and then you have Brad with the camera and a room full of presents, she clammed up a bit and tried to hide between my legs, but it wasn't long before she was off to explore her loot. Don't for a second feel bad for Avery, she was right there with her...Avery had to be watched very closely though as she tried to eat everything in sight and ended up choking many times on wrapping paper after taking a bite into each and every present she could get her grubby little paws on.

Even Riley got in on the fun, and yes, he opened his own present, he is a miracle dog.

It was a long morning, we started opening presents just after 8am and took a break around 10:30am and we had just finished our stockings and had yet to start the real presents. Santa left the girls a few unwrapped presents that distracted them for quite a while, so we didn't actually get into our stockings until probably closer to 9am. You can tell by Olivia's position, she was wiped out.

Our guests left just after 12 noon and Avery hit the hay for a nice long afternoon nap. Olivia was so wound up, she clearly got a second wind and wanted to play with all of her "toys", so it wasn't until closer to 2:15 that she finally settled down for a nap, which was too bad because we had to wake her from a deep sleep around 4:15pm to head to my parents for Christmas Dinner, which BTW was FAN-TASTIC. My Dad made a Beef Tenderloin and it was melt-in-your-mouth DELICIOUS. Kudos to him!

We came home and I was met at the door by a very wet nose and a very loose dog, Riley is always in his crate when we aren't home, but I must have forgotten to actually go lock him in before we left. I knew it was going to be bad news when I saw his nose as I opened the door, and sure enough my nose led me to the really bad news...the poor thing has been super smelly for the last two days as it was, but he ended up sharing his stench all over the family room, morning room and kitchen. YUCK. Brad had to clean up poop while I packed for the girls and put them both to bed.

We will head to The Turner's in the morning after saying our goodbyes to my Aunt and Uncle who are headed back to CT. We are looking forward to our time in Bassett. Brad plans to work down there on Monday and we will head back here on Tuesday to spend the evening with our family friends who are coming to visit my parents from Pinehurst, NC. Tis' the Season...