Christmas Morning...

Santa came and here is what he left...

A, much requested, basketball goal. A shopping cart with Melissa and Doug food sets and a set of soft food appropriate for Avi-Kate. (Man, Santa thinks of everything!) A jumbo beanbag to go with the red one he left last year. And a Weebles playhouse.

We always use brown paper to wrap our gifts and the same red and white ribbon every year. Well, thanks to Pinterest this year it was impossible to buy my normal two rolls of brown paper from my local craft store. (Don't get me wrong I LOVE Pinterest...but this was slightly frustrating since my options in Rome are limited and life with two small kids doesn't give me the freedom to track all over the world in search of paper.) Once again, Amazon Prime came to my rescue and I found a massive roll of paper that will now last us for YEARS. We also use different ribbon for each child. AG had the green ribbon and Avi-Cakes had a red polka dot ribbon this year. I love the simplicity and how understated it looks with the white lights.

Checking out what Santa brought. 

Samson was helping oversee the stockings.

Avi-Kate knew exactly what to do with Sophie.

She was completely content to sit and chomp away on her new Santa gifts. We let AG open her gifts for her and he was happy to help. Next year will be different I'm sure. :)

Since I hold a degree in Early Childhood Education I'm pretty particular about the books that we buy and add to our library. AG loves Peter Pan but the reality is that it will be years before he'll even be ready to read the classic novel. While browsing Amazon I stumbled upon a set of books illustrated by Mary Blair. Mary Blair was a top artist for Disney for years and her mark can be seen all over classic Disney films. Well, I found a set of classic books that are in a picture book format and Mary Blair's art work is the illustrations. They are BEAUTIFUL. We bought Peter Pan for AG and Alice In Wonderland for Avi-Kate. I want to add the others to our collection. Both stories are easily read and have incredible illustrations. They are perfect. If you want a classic scaled down for a young audience these fit the bill. 

Excited about Steve Jobs?! Yep. Can you tell that we are  MAC family? :)

We had a wonderful morning together. After breakfast we got ready and loaded up to head south to the farm. I'm hoping next year we'll get to stay home and Andy's family will come to us for a change...it's been a few years since we've hosted. So, we shall see. Up next Christmas night with the Edwards...