Christmas

On Christmas Eve we drove back to QC from SD just in time to take family pictures with our Matheson cousins, aunts, uncles & grandparents.  That evening was the traditional Christmas Eve dinner & gift exchange at the Lee's home.  Camille was soooo excited to get and open her present and was ready and willing to help everyone else open theirs too.  Eve was pretty cute too -- every time someone said that it was Christmas Eve she'd say, "No, I'm Christmas Eve!"

Camille loved everything about her present.

Alex and Carter at the Lee's.

 Christmas Day was lots of fun.  We did stockings and Santa gifts before heading off to church at 8am I'm not sure who picked the time but in the end it was good to start off the day thinking about the real meaning of Christmas.  After church we came home to open the rest of our presents in a more leisurely fashion.  After taking some gifts to a few of our neighbors we spent some time at Grandma & Grandpa Matheson's and then got to skype with Uncle Devon and the rest of Kartchner family.  The videos kept freezing up but it was fun while it lasted.  I think one of my favorite presents was taking a good long nap and I'm not sure, but I think my kids really enjoyed that I completely lost my voice that day (my annual case of laryngitis) and couldn't tell them to do much of anything.  I think the gifts that made the biggest hit were the basketball hoop Santa gave the boys and a CD player with CD's that we gave the girls.  There's been lots of dribbling and several dance concerts since opening them.

Eve, Carter, Brad, Lydia, Camille & Julie ready to check out Santa's gifts.

Eve got a Tangled doll, Lydia loved her much-desired make-up set and Camille in the background is being pushed in her new stroller.

Lydia, Eve, Brad.  The kids were all really thoughtful of others and made homemade gifts for eachother without any parental prompting.  Yay!

Carter was excited to get a new bike and Brad got a new remote control car.

Carter with his bow and arrow that Bradley made for him.

Brad and Eve with the Santa Claus given by our friend, Yolanda.

Brad surprised me with a set of hotpads he'd sewn himself.

I guess Alex and I haven't gone on enough dates lately because we both got eachother tickets -- the UA/Huskies game for him and Wicked for me.  You gotta have something under the tree though so he got a little Old Spice manliness and I got...a juicer (which I love!).