We are not sure who likes Santa Claus more, the kids or us. What we do know is that with kids our faith in the Christmas spirit is back. We used Norad to track Santa’s progress all day, even though our kids do not fully understand, we had a blast. It is only going to get better in years to come. In the days leading up to Christmas, our oldest, Blake, talked insistently about Santa coming. This year he wanted a “Jo Jo”. In case you are wondering, that is a bunny that plays hide and seek while you hide with a carrot that the bunny can track. Good ol’ Santa came through on that one. (what a relief). Blake decided Brayden wanted Weeble Wobbles. A flashback to our youth. Brian asked Santa for a Kindle and Judy asked Santa for a Baker’s Edge pan and new perfume. Jolly old St. Nick came through again. The kids enjoyed helping mom make oatmeal rasin cookies for Santa and Blake helped write a letter to Santa to put out with the milk and cookies.
On Christmas day the boys looked down stairs to see the tree all a glow. Presents spread from one end of the room to the other. They laughed with glee. Okay, maybe not glee, but they were excited.  Grandma and Grandpa joined us for the present opening frenzy. The highlights were the 6 foot long ($10, yes $10) cardboard house. Way cool, if you haven’t seen one. Another highlight was our new family addition Dorothy, a blue Beta fish. Midway through the gift opening we had to take an intermission to play with some of our new toys. Since the kids are 2 and 1 the gift opening lost its novelty. Post breakfast we gave it another go around and completed our Christmas present opening activities.
The kids are still finding new things to play with.. Again, those that require imagination are the biggest hits. The cardboard house has received the most play time. Second to the puppets. Blake likes to put on puppet shows. The rest of the stuff will probably disappear for a while and gradual resurface when it is not as likely to over stimulate the little guys.
Needless, to say, the thing we learned most for our Christmas day was that what matters most is spending time with family and living in the moment. Those are two gifts that no one can put a price on. The rest of the stuff is just icing on the cake.
We hope you had an enjoyable holiday spent with the ones you love. Merry Christmas!