Christmas 2016

We had ourselves a very merry little Christmas this year. The children got so into everything and it was just magical. 

 Christmas eve the kids were so excited to get their new Christmas jammies. Look how cute my children are! I can hardly believe it. I'm so lucky.

Clint reading the Night Before Christmas to 2 very excited children 

 The wee hours of the Christmas morn.  A quiet house and a lovely tree is quite a peaceful thing.

 Thomas woke up at 4:30 and was just too excited to sleep. He stayed in our bed til about 5 when he just couldn't take it anymore, so Clint, being the awesome dad that he is took him downstairs and played with him for a few hours til the other kids woke up. Finally we let thumbed go and wake up Caroline and they were so happy to see that Santa had come! Not only that, about 9 inches of snow came overnight as well.  We had just came to start opening our presents when we noticed that a snow plow had gotten stuck in our circle.  Clint hesitated for a moment and thought out loud, "I wonder if I should help him" to which Thomas immediately responded, "Well you have 2 choices, you help him or you don't!" Well when you put it that way.....Ha! Clint went to get changed to help the plow, but the plow got free by the time he had gotten dressed, but I thought it was so funny of Thomas.  We opened our presents from Santa and had some breakfast and then Clint had to leave to shovel snow at the Church. I'm glad Clint is so willing to always help and serve without hesitation. I am definitely not like that, I was a bit bummed to have him leave, but it turned out ok. We went to church and then came back and opened more presents and the kids didn't mind waiting.

 This little buddy! He slept through a good portion of the present opening and had to open most of his presents the next day!

 He was curious about the sleds!

 Santa brought the lady an Elsa Coronation dress

 Santa brought the little buddy this firetruck

 And Thomas got the Helicopter he had been asking for.

These two little sweeties. Thomas got Caroline a baby mermaid and it was quite the hit. 

 Post present opening explosion

 It will be a long time before he is so excited about getting socks

 Sweet little bookworm, part 1

sweet little bookworm, part 2

 Sweet little bookworm part 3

 The explosion just got bigger and bigger. Look how happy the littlest guy is!

 I'm dreaming of a white Christmas....but next year it would be nice to not have my husband have to spend so much time shoveling snow....

Our Pre-Christmas festivities

 Early in the month I took the little lady to see the Nutcracker. It was so fun. She is so sweet and lovely I had the best time getting to spend time one on one with her. She is just so delightful.

 Caroline's Joy school did the cutest little production of the Nativity. Caroline got cast as Joseph. At first she wasn't totally thrilled, but she was a good sport and did such a great job. She was so loving, protective and nurturing. It was adorable!

 Cutest little Joseph EVER

Thomas had a little kindergarten performance that Clint and I got to go to. It was fun seeing Thomas in his element. He is such a charismatic and energetic little boy.

Another fun thing about Christmas this year was doing the light the world program from the church website. It was such a positive thing for our family. The kids loved it, and it allowed for us to find ways to have a more Christ centered Christmas. It definitely got us out of our comfort zones and we learned a lot of things from the willingness of our sweet children to serve others and follow their promptings. We were able to do small acts of service, improve the quality of our prayers, meet new neighbors, spend time with the lonely, forgive others and just generally try to be better people. I hope our kids can remember the feeling hey got when serving others and remembering our savior on Christmas.