Christmas Day 2015

 Christmas morning is always so much fun. We woke up at 7 a.m. and this year we took extra time opening each gift. 

Lydia's favorite stocking gift was little yellow Russian dolls, pretend sticker nails and Hershey's Cookie and Cream. 

Santa Clause brought her a pair of Roller Blades. They are pretty cool. She was thrilled and put them on right away and didn't take them enough until bed time. 

Nana and Grandad bought us and all the Grandkids Minky blankets. They are the best things ever! 

Lydia gave Tyson a new wallet. His was 10 years old and falling apart. She was so excited for him to open it. 

The Cole's gave Lydia cash. She felt so rich with all those one dollar bills. Ha ha. 

She still loves One Direction. This love started 3 years ago around this same time. Silly girl. 

A new beautiful dress from my parents. 

We had to buy Lewis a present so he wouldn't feel left out. He couldn't contain his excitement. 

At 9 a.m. we jumped in the car and drove 20 minutes to go pick up Johne. He had a stash of gifts to open up at our home.

Santa brought him a race car track. Tyson spent the afternoon putting it together. It it pretty fun!

His all time favorite gift was a watch. He is always asking me what time it is, what time he has to go back with his workers and I knew he'd love it. I just didn't know how much. He looked at that thing 500 times on Christmas. He was in heaven. He wanted to know what time we were eating, what time the missionaries were coming and what time he had to leave and he made sure we stuck to the schedule. Funny kid! 

He also got lots of clothes. I learned that 10 year old boys really don't care about clothes. Ha ha. 

We played lots of our games on Christmas. We had planned to go to the beach but we Face Timed with family instead and by the time we finished with that I needed to get ready for the missionaries meal.  

 They all showed up right on time at 5 p.m. It was fun to hear about their phone calls home with family. I bought Elder Soriano some Balut. It is a little duck in an egg. I let him cook them and eat them. I made him try Egg nog. He loved it. I didn't try his Balut. I know I should have but I don't do baby animals in eggs. ;) 

Sis Baum, Bradford, Elder Joseph Smith, Elder Call, Elder Garae, Elder Gneiting, Elder Malupo, E Soriano & Holmes

I served Ham, baked potatoes, salad, veggetables, homemade crescent rolls, Pretzle dip for an appetizers and Peppermint Oreo dessert. Oh yes and one Elder requested Hawaiian Punch, so I made that happen too. 

After dinner we gave the missionaries a new tie and the sisters new earrings. I also let them open up the new Missionary Meal calendar I made for them on Shutterfly. They pass it around each week for dinner appointments. Definitely the gift that keeps on giving. ;) 

 Then we played Telestrations, a new game from the Jone's family. It was hilarious. We were laughing ourselves into tears. Then we played some games with the kids. Elder Kneiting is Johne's new favorite person in the whole world. They bonded for life.

Hilary bought us this new game called Suspend. It is my new favorite! So fun! 

Elder Holmes serenaded us as we visited. 

Ella the Elf flew off that night and she approved a hug good bye. 

Johne wanted in on that too. 

It was a long and full day. We picked up Johne at 9 a.m. and dropped him off at 9 p.m. I hope it was a day that he will always remember because I know that we definitely will.