Our Christmas Holiday

We had a great Christmas holiday. It began with a trip on Christmas Eve morning with a visit to Granny and Grampa's house (my parents). When the boys arrived, their eyes nearly popped out of their head. They saw presents everywhere. Of course, they immediately crawled in the middle of the presents and were ready to go. We opened presents and both boys did not understand that there was more than 1 present for them. They wanted to play with the first toy that they opened.
We made it home for nap time, and then we had Bryan's family arrive. It was so nice for them to come to us our first Christmas. We did not want to have to do a lot of traveling with the boys only being home 2 months. The boys loved playing with their cousins Stockton and Mark, as well as their aunts and uncle. Later that day, Lillie, Mark, Jetty and I decided to go to church. It was the job of Jimmy, Claire, and Papa to give the boys a bath and get them dressed to go to my parents' house for a small Christmas Eve party.
After church, we arrived at my parents'house to some commotion. Bryan came up and told me that Sawyer almost drowned in the tub. That was not the news I needed to hear - I immediately asked, "What the heck happened? There were three adults giving the baths, how could he have almost drowned?" Come to find out, he did not almost drown. They had put all three boys in the bathtub with bubbles. They turned on the jets on my whirlpool bath, and the bubbles increased dramatically. At one point, they could only see two heads. Sawyer was no where to be seen because the bubbles had grown over his head. After sifting through the bubbles, they found Sawyer - a bit shaken, but ok.
We had a great time at my parents, but it was getting late. We arrived back at our house and prepared for Santa and for bed. After getting on our pajamas, Lillie and Jetty read the boys the book, "The Night Before Christmas." We spread reindeer food outside, made a plate of cookies and a cup of milk, placed a towel with flour on it in front of the fireplace, said our prayers and went to bed. I had explained to Sutton that Santa would be coming and he would come down the chimney and walk through the flour - then we could trace his footprints. I did not know if he understood or not.
That night, Bryan and I had lots to do. There were several items that needed to be put together. Bryan called in reinforcements - my cousin Kyle and my uncle Jerry. They came over and put together a tractor, workbench, and trampoline. It was cold outside and very late, but they stayed until it was all done. We could not have done it without them. Uncle Jimmy was going to help, but he had to be put to bed because he had partaken in too much of the party. In fact, the funniest part of that night was Jimmy going to my sister's house to pick up the Gator that Santa brought for Stockton. Jimmy was a bit wobbly, but he left our house and walked to my sister's. He tried to drive the Gator here, but cousin Mark ran up with the CRV to help. My sister tells the story best, but she states that as she was going home from the party, she witnessed Mark driving the CRV with Jimmy walking behind it holding up the Gator. They had half of the Gator in the vehicle and the other half was being carried by Jimmy. I think my sister felt sorry for them, so the Gator was loaded into the my sister's truck, and then they all came to our house. Luckily, no children were waken with this fiasco, but it is a great story to remember. Jimmy was then taken to bed!!!
The next morning was awesome. The boys slept in our room, and when we opened the door to the living room, Sutton's joy was overwhelming. He immediately went to the flour that was footsteps all over the house. He said, " Momma, Momma, Santa come" then he made a whooshing noise and demonstrated with his hand how Santa had come down the chimney - and then he demonstrated Santa's footsteps by stomping his feet. I was overjoyed - He really did understand what we were saying !!!! Of course the boys loved the gifts, and later we went to my brother's house for our extended family's Christmas. We had a wonderful time, but Sawyer was miserable. He was itching, and we thought that he had a rash - possibly because he was allergic to something. We gave him a baking soda bath, and then went home early.
The next day (the 26th), we loaded up to go to Dallas to see Beebee (Bryan's father)and Nanna. It was the first time for the boys to meet them and they were excited. Of course it was a busy time with them running around and playing, but the boys finally got some 1:1 time with them right before they left. We were so excited to have been able to spend the holidays with the entire family. It was a real treat.
Once we got home, we decided to put some toys away because the boys were overwhelmed with toys. We decided to give them a few toys at a time as the holiday progressed. This has seemed to work because the boys came from a place where there were only community toys, to a place where there were toys everywhere. Although it seemed that we were busy the entire holiday season, it was great fun!