The Giant Dog and the Ewok who loves it

Mason fell in love with his giant dog the moment he laid eyes on it. He pulls it around the house and is sad that he can't sleep with it in his crib. He's our major stuffed animal lover and since his "special" stuffed animal (the one he's had since he was a newborn) is a dog, he's especially fond of the dog variety of stuffed animals.

Here's Mason showing off his catch and giving some love to his giant dog (while also holding 3 of his other dogs:




He also got a really cool monkey blanket from Nana and Pops that he wasn't sure about at first (he was a little overwhelmed from all of the presents) but now loves to wear. When he walks around it it and you don't see the monkey face, he looks like a little Ewok. It's so cute:

Christmas Part 3- The piles

I piled up each person's presents in individual stacks and then took some pictures of them. We definately had a good Christmas this year. We stuck to our budget and through finding great deals (a local toy store did a 60% off sale for customers on their mailing list) we were able to get more than we thought we would. We even managed to get Jefferson's #1 request- Optimus Prime- after we stupidly waited too long to get the one at Costco. It was the first "hot" toy we've had the experience dealing with at Christmas time and thankfully Ebay came to the rescue. We got the exact one from Costco and only paid $2 more than if I had gotten it at Costco to begin with because I found an auction in which the seller was from Salt Lake and he allowed us to pick it up, thus saving shipping costs, and since Nate works in Salt Lake we didn't even have to pay extra for the cost gas either. The pictures also include the gifts from Grandma and Grandpa (thank you!) and the clothes that I bought with the money from Nana and Pops (and a super thank you!). Jefferson's pile includes the joint presents for all of the boys.

Here's how we did:

Jefferson's pile (& shared toys)/ Jackson's pile


Mason's pile/ Mine and Nate's pile


The Transformers/ The Hot Wheels

Christmas Part 2- Opening presents

Yay! Present time! Jefferson jumped right into pulling presents out from around the tree and piling up all of his. We sorted a bunch so we could start a couple rounds of opening presents. We started out by doing rounds of youngest (Mason) to oldest (my dad) but we realized that since the kids had so many more presents than the adults, we needed to do a bunch of kid-only rounds. And then it became apparent that we needed to do some Jefferson-only rounds since he had several little things that made his total number of wrapped presents larger than his brothers (poor Mason and Jackson). Mason initially was only interested in stepping on the boxes but he soon got in on the paper-tearing action. Jackson was satisfied with the first present he opened (a Thomas the Tank playdough set) and it took a bit to get him to continue opening other presents. He got several Thomas the Tanks related things, so he definately was happy. Jefferson got several Transformers and was ecstatic about that and he also was way excited to finally get a scooter- and a Hot Wheels one at that! Mason very much loved the giant stuffed dog he got and the Monkey blanket from Nana. He was also excited to get a ride-on toy. All in all it was a great Christmas morning and the kids loved everything they got.

Nate got everything he needed to perform oil changes on the cars himself, a wireless mouse for his laptop, plus some surprise gifts- a Lithium-Ion drill, a trifle dish (he LOVES trifle), and a new snowbroom with bonus scraper (yay, now I can have mine back for my car!). I got a couple books (The Goose Girl, Fablehaven), some new games (the updated Cranium WOW, Last Word, Whoonu), a calendar, and a bunch of clothes.

Here are pics of the kids while opening presents (the first one was from Jefferson sneaking down as described in Christmas Part One):

Christmas Part 1- Waiting for Daddy (and Grandma and Grandpa)

Strangely, Nate and I both woke up before the kids on Christmas morning. Since it had snowed on Christmas Eve and throughout the night, Nate decided to go out and do some snow shoveling while waiting for the kids to get up. First, he helped our next-door neighbor shovel his driveway and the sidewalk in front of the house and then he went over to the church building to see if any shoveling was going on over there. While he was out the kids woke up and they (well, mainly Jefferson) were anxious to get downstairs. I held them off on the stairs while I called Nate to tell him to get back and called my parents to see if they were on their way. My parents beat Nate to the house and they distracted me just long enough that Jefferson snuck down and saw all of the presents before I could get a picture of his expression. He also saw the one unwrapped present- a Lionel Train bank from my parents - before I shooed him back onto the stairs. Nate arrived a couple minutes later, having never shoveled our own driveway and sidewalk.

Here are some pictures of the kids waiting on the stairs (the last two were after everyone was home and they were extra excited and I told them to make silly faces):

Jefferson's Kindergarten Christmas Program

On the 17th, Jefferson's kindergarten class had a Christmas program. Grandma, Jackson, Mason, and I went to watch. They sang several Christmas songs including Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, Jingle Bells, and We Wish You A Merry Christmas (links not from Jefferson's class). Jefferson got to be one of the kids jingling bells during Jingle Bells and thoroughly enjoyed it. Each kid in his class also got to ask Santa to bring a toy to one of their friends. Jefferson's was "Dear Santa, please bring Thomas and Transformers to Damon." Near the end of the program Jefferson decided that Jackson needed to come down and join him. It was cute.

Here's some pictures from the day: