It's Christmas today! We have had a really good morning so far. We got up and kept the kids upstairs until we were ready to all go downstairs together. The kids were beyond excited, of course! They checked out their presents and stockings and then we had breakfast... can't go into a morning of opening presents without food in us! ;) Every year, before we open our presents, we make sure that we sit down together and read the scriptures, and read of Christ's birth. Then we also watched a Mormon Message on Christmas... love love love the Mormon Messages! We all feel the spirit when we watch them... perfect way to start Christmas morning. :) While Bryce was reading with us, I got the turkey in oven... I had a feeling that if I waited until afterwards it would be too late in the morning and it might not have enough time to cook. I was right, we just finished about 10 minutes ago! It took us until almost noon! (We each take a turn opening a present, this way it becomes an event, not just 5 minutes of tearing open presents and being done.)
It's been such a nice morning! The highlight for me was Bryce's gift to me. Going into this Christmas, we decided that we were paying cash for everything. Everything. We don't want to paying off Christmas for 6 months after the fact! ;) Anyways, I start shopping early in the year and buy all year long so that we aren't broke in December and January. We also decided at one point, when things were feeling 'lean' for us, that we wouldn't buy each other presents this year. So we went into this Christmas not expecting anything from each other. That was fine, we were ok with that. I had already bought Bryce a present (slippers... his old ones were old and falling apart... I knew he needed new ones, so I had bought them a few weeks before we had decided not to do anything.) I had also scheduled a wedding cake for right before Christmas ~ I knew it would help the finances and that I could use some of that money to give Bryce a little money so he could go to Cabella's and buy some hunting things. (I would have gone to Cabella's and bought a gift card but I knew that if I went, I'd have little people who would have just told daddy what his present was!) Bryce did give me a card this morning, with a wonderful note (I LOVE his notes!!) and he had rolled up some money so that I could have a little 'mad money' to spend. He had taken a little out of our account over the months so that I wouldn't notice and so that it wouldn't impact our finances and he stashed it away so he could give it to me. So sweet! I appreciate that he did that for me, it's hard to spend money on myself, I always feel a little guilty doing that. BUT then he had us all come to the office to give me my second present. Bryce made a slideshow of our whole life together, from 1995 to 2012!!! It was the BEST present I've ever been given! I have no idea when he found time to work on it, and I had NO idea he was working on it! He did such a great job! I don't want to loose it ever, so I'm posting it on here!! It was wonderful to look back over the years and to see all that we have gone through. So many memories, so many places we have lived, so many pregnant pictures of me (lol), Bryce with hair & Bryce with less hair, then Bryce bald (lol), all our children as babies, the first days of videos without any sound and video clips with sound. My little people are growing up (*tears*)... we looked so young... I see us aging... I'm happy to be getting older with Bryce... I love him. He's my favorite person in this whole world!! He knew what I needed this year... I just wanted to be remembered this Christmas. I don't need stuff... stuff is just stuff. It won't come with me when I die one day, but my memories and my relationships will. This was such a wonderful thing for him to have done! LOVE YOU BRYCE!! I wish I could post it on here... it's too long to upload... I'm trying to post it to Facebook... hopefully it'll work there!
The kids opening their stockings. Dallin kept saying, "Mine!" He's a true 2 yr old.
Happy boys!
"Now what am I supposed to do with this box?"
Dallin loves the candy that Santa brings. (Santa only brings candy & chocolate to our house.)
Bryce helping Dallin open his trains. (By the way, I save cracker, cereal boxes, etc all month long so that we can wrap our presents easily. Plus if a present 'accidentally' gets opened a bit, no one will know what the present is.)
Dallin is a happy camper!
June loves her head phones!
Noah's happy about his Transformer! Dad got a lot of hugs from Noah today!
Cute little Dallin. Love my little boy!!
Madi and her Zhu Zhu pet. Last year we bought one for her but Dallin threw it in the toilet. Nice brother! Madi still wanted one (she talked about them all fall) so I bought one from Ebay for her. It came here all the way from Hong Kong! (my favorite place to by things... that's where all of Dallin's trains came from. I think I paid about $26 for 7 trains, with free shipping. LOVE DEALS.)
Adam and his pjs.
June and her iTunes gift card. Happy girl!
Dallin playing with trains...
...and still playing with trains!
Madi opening her jewelry!
Madi blinging it up!
June opening up her watch...
... she was surprised!
Madi still trying on jewelry. (see the theme of Madi's presents, lol)
Noah and his alarm clock. He starts seminary next fall... he'll get alot of use out of this present! (little does he know, lol)
Serious Dallin working on opening his present.
Dad helping Dalllin. (I love Dallin's cute little hands!)
Adam opening his big present
June's such a beautiful girl!
Dallin opening up a new pair of mitts from Grandma Rogers.
More Madi with jewelry...
... great expressions!
Adam and his new fishing stuff :)
Boys are never too old for Nerf guns ;)
Dallin in his new hoody
Madi opening up her new mitts... she's pretty happy about them. She kept wanting me to put my hands in them to feel how nice they feel. Thank you Grandma Rogers!
Dalllin playing with one of those mechanical bugs. Adam's friend gave it to him for his birthday a couple weeks ago. Dallin loves them... he's pretty cute to watch play with Adam's bug. :)
June and her new slippers and orange nail polish. (her favorite color)
Dallin's getting the hang of opening presents
Dallin LOVES Thomas the Train. I found some pjs for him...
... Bryce is helping Dallin put his new jammies on. I just LOVE his little toddler legs and diaper. So stinkin cute! Love you Dallin!
Madi's outfit just gets more interesting as the day goes on, lol. She's such a girl! Love it!
June & Dallin are buddies!
June is a natural with Dallin & little kids. Love this pic of June & Dallin!
WOW. Now that's a pair of sunglasses! She totally loves them!
Woo-hoo! Madi's having a great time!
Adam's happy that he got a little more Ninjago stuff (and not more clothes, lol).
My handsome boys :)
Think June's having fun yet?!? ;)
Bryce and the kids :)
Adam, June & Noah... oh wait, and Dallin in the mirror! The kids are holding their presents from Grandpa Rollins. It's apple TV, the cable you need to plug the apple TV in & a schwack load of iTunes gift cards. This is the gift that keeps on giving! Happy children & happy parents too!
We had one more BIG surprise. My parents surprised us with a new piano! WOW!! SOOOO nice! We are still in shock! THANK YOU mom & dad Hogg!! Love you lots! We are loving playing every day... I am loving hearing June play every day! It's absolutely wonderful!
Life is good. We have so much to be grateful for. Somehow we never go under & we never go without. I know this post may look like it's about stuff, but for me, it's about my children being happy. I am grateful for Christmas. For the time we can be together as a family, so recognize the blessings we have and to remember the experiences we have had. I am grateful for the Savior Jesus Christ. I am so grateful that He was born, that He lived and died for us. I am grateful for the example He set for us, to teach us how to live so that we can return to our Heavenly Father. I'm looking forward to the rest of this day... to watch more things about the life of the Savior... and to spend more time with my family.
Merry Christmas!
