Christmas Continued...

The day after Christmas Mike, the girls & I were in a post-Christmas haze. The girls who had been up at 4 am on Christmas Morning redeemed themselves and slept till 10 am! It was glorious! That afternoon we got a call that our special visitors had arrived; my Dad and my Step Mom Karen! That evening they came over with MORE presents for the girls and a special surprise for Mike & I.

Here's the girls opening presents... again. :)

And this is mine & Mike's new iMac G5!

Mike & I can't thank my Dad & my Step Mom Karen enough for this VERY GENEROUS gift!

Mike & I are absolutely THRILLED!

Fa Ra Ra Ra Ra & Christmas Naps

After we opened presents Christmas Morning we cleaned up, got dressed and waited for Grandma and Grandpa Schuth to arrive. It was just going to be the 6 of us for the day. Most holidays I would be more than happy to cook a family dinner but frankly, Christmas Day is the LAST day I want to be cooking, cleaning or driving anywhere. My girls just want to play with their new toys and I want to spend every Christmas minute with them! Christmas comes and goes so quickly I just want the day to be as carefree as possible. Thankfully, Grandma & Grandpa wanted to keep things easy too. It might sound ludicrous to some but we opted to go to the local Chinese Buffet for an early dinner. Fa Ra Ra Ra Ra!

Around 1 pm we got in our cars and drove a whole 3 minutes to the Chinese Buffet. Huey and Lee the owners were happy to see us! We've been visiting the buffet and ordering take out from this restaurant for 8 years! We enjoyed our usual favorites; soup, egg rolls, fried rice, sushi, crab legs and hot sake... as well as some traditional holiday turkey, ham, stuffing and mashed potatoes. It was delicious! We left the restaurant 90 minutes later with full happy bellies!

Grandma & Grandpa were getting tired and had a long drive back to their condo so they left around 4 pm. Around that time the girls were wearing out too. We laid Mikayla down for a nap and I turned on A Christmas Story. Maddy & I cuddled up on the couch and drifted off to sleep.

It was about 6:30 and the girls were still out like lights. I went and got Mikayla up from her crib and then tried to wake up Maddy on the couch. Neither of them wanted to wake up! It took about 15 minutes but my girls finally came out of their Christmas comas. We spent the rest of the night playing with their new toys and watching Christmas movies. It was a prefect day... aside from the 4 am wake up call. :)

"MOM! Leave me alone! I just want to sleep!"

Christmas Morning

The girls were soooo happy when the sun finally rose on Christmas Morning! Santa had come and it was time to open presents!

I just wanted one good picture of the girls before they started opening their presents from Santa... this was the best I got! :)

Ooooo!

Ahhh!

Cool!

Mikayla enjoyed opening presents so much she insisted on opening mine too. This Bath & Body Pink lotion sure smells good!

SANTA CAME!

Every Christmas Eve I have a few duties to attend to! After Mike & I got our excited girls to bed and got our Christmas Eve haul unloaded, I still needed to finish my final Christmas preparations! It's a tradition for me to watch It's A Wonderful Life while I work. Mike always falls asleep but for me I HAVE to finish the movie before I can go to bed! Unfortunately, this tradition kept me up till 1:30 am and now it's a tradition I will have probably have to reconsider. I was NOT expecting my girls to wake up 2 1/2 hours later! Yes, that's right! Maddy & Mikayla were awake at 4 am!

"SANTA CAME!" They cried! I tried my best to get them back to sleep but it wasn't happening. I managed to hold them off till sunrise but neither me, Maddy or Mikayla got much sleep! Mike of course slept like a rock all night.

Our tree when I went to bed... before Santa came!

Next year 'when' my girls get up at 4 am I'll be more rested and better prepared! I say 'when' because I expect this to happen again next year. Gone are the days of my girls sleeping until 7 or 8 am on Christmas! From what I'm told I can expect these early Christmas awakenings until my girls are teenagers. :)

Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve was a bit hectic. As prepared as I tried to be for Christmas I still needed to make a last minute run to the grocery store. I still needed to wrap a few presents and I still needed to bake cookies for Santa! Amazingly, with a little help from Mike & the girls we got everything done in time to leave for Auntie Lauren & Uncle Gregg's.

It's a family tradition since we moved to Florida that we get together with Mike's parents and his siblings on Christmas Eve to open presents and enjoy some delicious appetizers. We all came together around 4:30 to get the night rolling.

This year we were missing 3 important members of our family; Auntie Allison, Uncle Mike and Cousin Cam went to Chicago for Christmas. We missed them a lot but got to enjoy the company of two other special people for Christmas Eve... Gregg's Mom Dory and our friend Dave.

The Newlyweds! 1st Christmas as Husband & Wife!

Merry Christmas! Can we open our presents already!?

Maddy & Mikayla both had lots of presents to open! Auntie Lauren & Grandma picked out some exciting stuff for their favorite girls! It was a very Happy Christmas Eve!

Christmas Lights

There's a man here in town that decorates his acre of property every year for Christmas. He's an electrician and an all around Christmas junkie. Every night from 6-10pm throughout the Christmas Season Mr. Eander greets the public and allows them walk around his property and enjoy his magnificent and original displays.

Mr. Eander has all kinds of manmade rock gardens and ponds which help bring his displays to life. This one above is his erupting volcano! Notice the flame at the top, the lava ropes and the dinosaurs! WOW!

This is Captain Hook's pirate ship with Peter Pan & Tinkerbell.

Very cool!

See you again next year Mr. Eander!

Christmas Play Date

WOW! I am really behind with blog posts! Our 2009 Christmas Holiday was a BUSY one! So lets catch up!

Last Tuesday, during Maddy's first week of Winter Break we were invited to meet up with our best friends Jackie, Collin and Conner and some of their friends at Phillippi Park in Sarasota. The girls & I had never been to Phillippi Park to play and we really enjoyed it! The park itself is on Phillippi Creek. Of course there is a playground but what makes this park so nice is it's gazebos and wide sidewalks. The moms and kids that invited us brought scooters and bikes as well as some holiday crafts! In the gazebo there was a two tables set up, one to decorate ornaments and the other to decorate gingerbread cookies!

Here's some pictures from our holiday play date! It was a COLD day but Maddy & Mikayla had a lot of fun!