Santa Came!

Christmas this year we kept simple.  Every year about 10:30 PM when we get out all the presents to place under the tree (err Santa does) we find a few of them have multiplied beyond reason and we have way more than we thought.  What ends up happening is that the kids end up thrilled and then overcome with the gifts to the point that they don't really  - really  - enjoy all of them.  So this year we made sure to not buy a ton of things, remembering that they also get gifts from grandparents, cousins and Andy's work.  The result?  A wonderfully pleasant Christmas day where the kids thoroughly enjoyed everything they got and played blissfully with it all.  Here are some pictures of some of the bounty:

 Ruby got a princess dress up - loves it, refuses to take it off.  Also, I might mention how adorable it is when kids this age climb up onto your bed to announce with all the awe and excitement in the world that Santa came!!!  Its magic and we love it.

 Lyman got his first set of scriptures.  He is very excited and loves to read from them.  He also has been very good about being careful with them after Andy showed him all the more fancy things about a real leather bound set vs the paperbacks we were using as a family.

 He also got a 5000 fact book.  Perfect for the 8 yr old mind especially when it has so many neat facts about things like peanut butter and frogs and icky things.  National Geographic did well - did you know that a baby whale gains 200 lbs a day or that the human brain is 78% water?  Neither did we, but now we do.

 Corilynn got a picnic basket set and a princess CD player.  Its not a real CD player but it has plastic CDs that she can put in it and it will play a few princess songs (Bibbity Bobbity Boo).  She was in heaven.

Ruby also got a set of plastic building pieces.  She had fun making a princess tower.  Go figure.