Christmas Day

Thomas stayed true to his promise of not going downstairs before the rest of us, and we actually didn't get woken up at the crack of dawn since they got off to bed too late last night. Maybe we'll try that again next year. Everyone seemed pretty happy with the things that Santa had left for them. Thomas got his much desired Millennium Falcon ship, Olivia added to her Thomas the Train set and Zach got a basketball hoop. He dunked the ball in the net as soon as his feet hit the floor. I was so happy that he seemed to instinctively know that the gift was for him, but even better yet that he had actually liked it. I thought that we were onto a real winner with the old hoop and then he didn't show much interest in it at all for the rest of the day!


The presents from under the tree were opened and stockings were emptied.Fruit and cereal boxes were retrieved and then we managed to get the kids to eat their breakfast before the main event of the day began - playing! Everyone seemed happy with the things that they got. Thomas did manage to get himself into a bit of trouble during present opening though when he was just ripping the wrapping off everything as fast as he could. We told him that he needed to slow down and take turns. Gone was his speech about the only thing he really wanted for Christmas was to spend time with his family. The sentiment was lovely, but not all together true it didn't appear. I guess I will just have to rethink things again next year. I am constantly trying to think of ways to make Christmas more meaningful and focus on the giving rather than receiving and on what we should really be thinking about. We'll see if I ever manage that one.

Here's a bit of video that might only be interesting to the grandparents!

Spense seemed to spend the entire day talking on the phone to family members. I just said a quick "hello" to my crew earlier in the day and that was that. I guess that's just the beauty of only having 1 sibling who currently lives with mum and dad!

Pouring in the eggs is always her favorite part

Since she has a thing for making cupcakes I knew it would be a hit

Olivia sported her new apron when she helped Spense make the sponge for the trifle, and she kept it on for the rest of the day. Dinner was pretty laid back. We had roast beef, but tried to scale back on too many of the trimmings. I just felt like I spent too much time cooking in the kitchen last year and not enough time with everyone else, making a meal that only Spense and I ate. At least we did have Zach this year who seems to eat pretty much anything and Mike, Spenser's friend from college, also came by. He's out here making a movie right now and doesn't have anyone in town so we didn't want him to be alone. Olivia enjoyed toasting with the fancy glasses. We had many a toast to "Christmas Day!"

I decided that I would make an effort with the table
this year since I usually just focus on the menu and
am then sad that the table looks naff.

Place setting complete with traditional British cracker
Mike thought that it was bizarre to pull something
that contained a hat to wear at dinner.

Since there were so many of us I thought everyone
should know where they needed to sit!
These were actually a lot cuter in my head
than they turned out to be!

After clean up and a couple of games of checkers and Cariboo we were all pooped and headed off to bed grateful for the time we had spent together and for the things we had received.

Olivia loved her Olivia the pig.