Very Merry Christmas

This year we kept it pretty simple for Christmas. I am finding in my old age that I am getting a little sick of all the hype centered around Santa and presents and greed. I really wanted to show my kids that Christmas is about Christ and giving. We mostly tried to just spend time together and read Christmas stories and do family activities. 

One of our activities included making a gingerbread train. The kids had a ball!!

We also pulled out the Little People Nativity and the boys set it up all by themselves. We talked about the baby Jesus and the story of Christ's birth. The kids enjoyed it so much that we ended up doing this a few different times.

On Christmas Eve Russ had to be in Cleveland at a clinical rotation and wasn't able to return home until about 10am on Christmas morning. The boys and I spent the day hanging out with friends and neighbors. In the morning we went to a families house in our ward and had breakfast and played games. There were a ton of families and we had an amazing time. That evening we went to our friends house and had dinner. They made prime rib and it was delicious. We had so much fun just hanging out. We wished that Russ could have been there with us, but we made the most of it.

That evening the kids decided that they wanted it to be a white Christmas, so they created their own snow out of white paper dots from the three hole punch. It was delightful!!

 I didn't take any pictures of unwrapping gifts, but we had to take pictures of the gift that Grandma and Grandpa Flint sent because they are just awesome!! They are called stomp rockets. We took them outside Christmas afternoon and played with them for over an hour. The neighbor kids had to come check them out too. Seriously fun toy, I totally recommend them!!

Wyatt wasn't quite big enough to stomp hard enough to get his rocket to fly, so we would help in out by picking him up and setting him down quickly on the stomp pad. 

 Cody got the hang of it immediately!!

 That night we had Wes come over (he was in Cleveland with Russ so he missed all the festivities too) and had steak and shrimp for dinner.

We had a great time just hanging out and playing with the kids and their new toys for Christmas. I enjoyed a more simple Christmas and hope to have more like it in the future.