Christmas Day

We woke up Christmas morning to new snow falling and a very white and 'quiet' world outside. It was beautiful. The boys even slept in until 8:00, which gave Jared and I a quiet morning and an early start on making breakfast. We had bought each of the boys one large present and left it unwrapped under the tree. It was fun to watch them come into the living room. Josiah came in, saw his gift under the tree, thought for a moment, and then asked "mommy, who's guitar is that?" Jared and I didn't answer completely at first, it was fun watching his excitement.

He and Jacob played with their two gifts while I finished making breakfast, then we ate. I think this is probably the only Christmas where we will eat before opening gifts. The boys had no idea there were gifts to open on Christmas, we had not ever talked about it. After breakfast we opened our last Jesse tree ornament and Jared read the story of the birth of Christ, sang some songs, and thanked God for His son. Jared was the first to open gifts, Josiah was very excited to give Daddy a present he had wrapped. Then, for the first time, Josiah learned there were some gifts under the tree for him too. Wow, this got the boys going. We spent the next couple hours opening and playing. It was great fun. Notice all the priority mail boxes. We received 7 packages, yes SEVEN, from family in the states!!! Can you imagine? I cannot tell you how much those packages meant to us. We were given bits of home in each and every package, and special gifts directly from our loved ones. What a blessing!

Soon after opening gifts we spent over an hour on Skype with family in Oregon. We were able to see and talk with many of the Dugans and Jared's parents. The boys spent much of the time showing off their new toys. Not quite like being there, but almost. The rest of the day was spent playing, sitting around, and just enjoying the day. We did have a somewhat big dinner that night, with another family coming over to join us. It was definitely 'easy going', I was not up for a lot of work :) We had a great day as a family, a day where we thanked the Father for the gift of His son, and also were blessed by our extended family. Wow, do we have a lot to be thankful for.