Catch Up part 4

 Christmas morning!  I believe this is Christmas round 2, once my family arrived.  My children of course already opened up their presents early morning.  We made them clean their room before coming out to open presents, which funny how it only took them 5 minutes, and every other time, it takes them until the end of time.

 Macie's big gifts were her Puppy Surprise and her Palace Pet Puppy that she can move around with a wand.

Chloe's big gift was her Frozen Barbie closet, which makes me crazy with the little barbie shoes that are already lost.

Grandpa bought them a Doll Trailer, like a play camping trailer, which is the coolest toy I have ever seen.  

we had a really laid back Christmas day.  We had our usual german pancakes and breakast burritos with my family, and then we all fell asleep watching "White Christmas." Later that afternoon our neighbor Curtis had a get together, so Don and I went for a little while to that.  Other than that, we spent most of the day lounging around the house.  The girls had their new toys to play with and had a great time doing that.  We also played some of our new games with them. By the way, the game "Operation" is not what it used to be.  The slots for the little plastic things you have to remove are ridiculously big. you actually have to try to make the buzzer go off. Don and I were so disappointed!

 Christmas eve, Chloe left this letter for our elf Sugar.

 And our picture and some cookies.  I hope the Elf doesn't come back next year.
But she probably will.  Because Sugar knows how much the kids love her.

 Christmas eve was the Mortensen family dinner and Christmas eve program.  We had a lovely time as always.  One of our favorite highlights of the Christmas season every year.  Grandma and Grandpa Mortensen gave all the kids books of brand new 1 dollar bills that they can just rip off like a coupon book.  They loved that.  And Macie got a tea set this year for the Bible Quiz Grandpa does every year, and Chloe got an activity book, which they were also really excited about.

And Don and I stayed up until 2 AM this year, although I told myself that was not going to happen again after last year.  But it was worth it.  Seeing the kids have the kinds of Christmas that we had as kids...that's the pay off.