Christmas

So now it's a quiet Sunday night, following probably one of the busiest Christmases we've ever had!

Charlie's plane was delayed half an hour on Thursday. It kinda sucked... so I bathed Natalia and put her in her warm PJ's and then buckled her in to head towards the airport. Once there, I noticed that there was this group of people dancing in the center of the airport. Low and behold there was my mom! She has been doing dance classes for a while now, and their little group was performing. Natalia was instantly happy to see her grammy. Of course when it came time to go up to the exit gate to wait for dada she was not having that. She was so tired and cranky so leaving grammy was just the end of the world. Anyway, dada's plane finally arrived so we went up to greet him and take him home! It seemed as though he had a lot of fun on his trip. Lucky his plane was delayed though because they barely made it to the airport in Salt Lake. He totally lost his voice from screaming at the game so much.

Christmas Eve started out as a quiet normal morning. We went to lunch with my friend Cheryl and then went to visit my Grandma Merrill for a couple of hours. Charlie went and had a productive afternoon stocking shopping for me. =) The saddest thing happened though... he was hanging my over stuffed stocking up on the fireplace and the holder fell on our wedding plate. This plate was a gift from his sister Steph and her husband John for our wedding. It's purple, has our names, and our wedding date. It's beautiful and was our favorite gift out of everything from the wedding. Anyway, the plate suffered damages. Luckily it wasn't totally shattered, just a few pieces broke off and Charlie managed to salvage it with some super glue. I actually shed a few tears when I saw it... but at least we still have it right? After Natalia took her nap we loaded up the car and headed out to my aunt's house for Christmas Eve dinner with my mom's side of the family. We had some of the most delicious ham ever! Natalia scarfed it up, I wasn't sure she would eat it, but she loved it! She also got a couple of gifts from my aunts. They were for her "baby" a stroller, highchair, crib, and rocking horse. So stinking cute. She hasn't stopped playing with them since dada built them for her yesterday. We didn't get home until 9:30, putting Natalia in bed around 10:00pm... poor thing. But she was having so much fun we didn't want to leave. We are so thankful that we have all this family so close together to spend time with. This Christmas Eve dinner has taken place for years now, ever since everyone moved here from El Salvador, so it means a lot to me. After Natalia went to bed, it was time to prep for Santa's visit. Charlie built Natalia's wagon, and we put out her presents and then went to bed exhausted.

Christmas Day Natalia woke up at 7:45am as usual. You would think that after going to bed so late she'd want to sleep in... oh no not this kiddo. We quickly ran downstairs and lit up all the Christmas lights inside. We brought her down and showed her the new big red wagon. She instantly loved it and wanted inside. So that is where she proceeded to open all her gifts. It was too cute. I think I did good and didn't go overboard. The wagon was her main gift and then I got her just a couple of small things, plus her stocking. Charlie and I exchanged our stockings. We didn't really have gifts for each other this year. Since he went to Vegas that was his big gift from me. And, my big gift didn't come in time. I'm super excited for it though. I was sad thinking that I'm going to have to put away my pretty Coach purse for a diaper bag again when we have another baby. And it seems so wrong to do that when it's so pretty! So... I'm getting a Coach diaper bag instead. He he he. I know it's crazy, but it'll last me forever because it's such a good product. Plus when we are done having babies I can use it for something else. Not to mention I found a good deal on Ebay as always. Anyway, I'm excited for it to come. We quickly got ready to go and went onto our next celebration. First stop was Charlie's dad's house. I'm super excited for our new sling we got. It's perfect because I can still use it with Natalia and carry her on my hip. I'm hoping we'll get to go to Texas next spring to visit family and it will come in handy for our airport travels. Plus, someday when baby #2 comes, I can carry him/her around while chasing Natalia. =) Cece made us a delicious breakfast casserole that had egg's and something spicy in it, and we got more ham. Yummy! After Thanksgiving we were totally burnt out on turkey so ham has been a welcome change. As we were leaving I made the mistake of letting Natalia have our camera for less them a minute and she broke it! GRRR! I'm so frustrated with myself for that one. I'm so camera happy when it comes to that child, it's been difficult not being able to take pictures of her. I'm going to take it to Idaho Camera tomorrow to see how much it would cost to fix it, but in the end it might be better to just buy a new one. We can get something similar to what we have for about a third of what we paid for it back then. Doh! I just hate using Christmas money for it when we had a perfectly fine one. Charlie bought me that camera almost 5 years ago as a graduation/birthday present, and it's been all over with us, so it's lived a nice long life really. Oh well. Anyway, we came home and Natalia crashed... which meant I took a nap too. =) Charlie played Wii because he got some new games for Christmas. Then we made dinner and got ready for my dad's visit. I made a yummy pot roast for dinner and Natalia scarfed it down again! Sometimes that kid surprises me with how much she'll eat. We had a great night with my dad and family as usual.

Today was a quiet relaxed day. I did some post Christmas clearance shopping. I hate paying full price for Christmas stuff knowing how cheap it gets after Christmas. One year I scored our snowman dishes for super cheap, and I love getting them out each year to use. This year my focus was to get an extra stocking holder and fuzzy red/white stocking for next Christmas. We don't have a need for it yet, but I'm hoping by next Christmas we'll need it. ;) I also got more wrapping paper, a thing that holds all the paper, lots of extra Christmas lights, some Christmas PJ's for Natalia in a size that should fit next fall. And, I finally got a Rubbermaid wreath box! I swear every year I go to get one, they are already out. I finally got one for $6! I didn't get anything decorative for the house like I usually do. Mostly because we have so much as it is and really don't need anymore until we move to a bigger house. So I'll just wait until then to get that kind of stuff.

So anyway... that about sums up our Christmas. We are so lucky to get to spend so much time with our family and have so many places to be. I love Christmas so much, it just a magical time of year. I mean we get to see our family a lot throughout the week, but it's just so much more special over Christmas. Tomorrow it's back to normal. I'll have to start taking down our Christmas stuff which always makes me a little sad. Oh, and I've been posting pictures in the December/Christmas 2010 album. I'll keep posting as I get more from others.

It feels like this year just went by way too fast. I remember writing last year's Christmas post and thinking about the year to come. It has been a very amazing year for us. We are so blessed and fortunate. Life is very good to us. I can't wait to see what new adventures 2011 will bring us.