Christmas day 2013

Marty told the church (as he MC'd the service) last week that I always get up before the kids on Christmas day.  It is the ONLY day of the year I wake up first in my house.  No exception this year.  I was up at 4am...then 6am...and finally caved and got out of bed at 7am! But nope, even then I still had to wait until 7.30am before the girls appeared, and we tried waking Luke but he rolled over and ignored us.  He joined us later..and once he got into the whole present thing he was away: all day he was asking to "open present?".  The girls were so excited about Christmas this year, as they get older they really get into it so we had lots of fun together.

  

We started the morning with stocking opening and a fairly normal routine of breakfast, before heading off to church for the morning service.  I love seeing my wider church family on Christmas day and sharing well wishes, it really sets the whole mood for the day.  Then it was straight off to join the cousins, aunties, uncles, and nana at Granma and Grandads house.  Present time was chaos with 7 very young children all opening the bounty of gifts at once, but that is all part of it.  The kids were delighted to recieve Ukelele's and have been  strumming (terribly, must take lessons on YouTube) them ever since - Kate has even written her first song.  It pretty much says on the paper "I love my ukelele x3.  It is soooooo muuuuchhhh funnnn yeahhhhhhh"!!  Love it Kate, keep up the songwriting.  

 After a huge roast lamb lunch followed by an even bigger dessert, we sat in the sun and chilled as the cousins played.  As the tears grew louder from tired children though, we nudged ourselves along to head home for a bit of a rest before the other side of the family arrived for dinner at ours...oh yeah, and our kids finally got the chance to unwrap their presents from US!  The girls were delighted to get lego friends (girl lego) and Luke loves his 3 wheel scooter.  A quick skype with Poppa and Oma in Auckland was the perfect addition to our family day, I love skype, its so much nicer then a phone call on these occasions!

Then it was all go again, with a BBQ dinner and dessert that we barely dented after a day full of eating.  Gramps and Colleen totally spoilt the grandchildren, with a very realistic T-rex for Luke and new duvets for the girls being highlights.

 Dinner was full of laughs and fun with Martys sisters and their families and his cuzzie AJ joining us.  Once the kids settled down, we got the cocktails flowing and started a very rowdy and hilarious game of Charades on the ipad.  This version of the game requires you to hold the ipad to your head and you have to guess whose/what name is on the screen based on the help from everyone else giving clues via describing/impersonating/humming/acting.  It was so funny and we kept the fun going until 11pm that night!

You're a reindeer obviously!!!

Boxing day fun with the new toys

And that brings us to Boxing day, when I have CRASHED on the energy levels after a totally busy fortnight.  I woke up with a headache that has lasted all day (hmmm...result of cocktails or just tiredness?!).   We were all tired out - Kate and Luke didn't even get dressed at all today.  I spent most of the day cleaning up the house, exchanging double up lego (I am NUTS for going into the Warehouse today) and playing with the kids new toys with them.  But finally i gave in and had a nap in the afternoon and then us girls blobbed in front of a movie before a dinner of leftovers.  And now I think its more Christmas TV before an early night for me....Merry Christmas!