Keeping Up With Us...: Our Christmas

We love Christmas at our house. Richard and I always have and with the boys Christmas is that much more fun. It is such a special time of year and we enjoy every minute of it. We had a wonderful day, starting with church at 9 and then presents after that ( yes, my boys still sleep in- thank heavens) We had a couple of fun surprises for some of us and the boys had lots of fun and got exactly what they ordered from Santa and lots that they didn't order :) Enjoy the pictures!

Before we started opening gifts

Let the fun begin! He wanted this very specific tractor...

And he was just happy to open and check every gift out.

They were both kept busy for a little while

My new necklace from the boys.
I also got a beautiful book shelf that Richard and the boys made for me out of pine logs.
I was surprised and very excited! I have the best boys around!

Richard was to say the least surprised with his gift... He opened a box that had a new pair of spurs in it, that is the only thing he actually asked for, in the box with the spurs was a little note explaining a few things and license plates for the Jeep. He looked out the window and this was what he saw in the driveway:)
For years we have talked about getting a Jeep. We ran around in Uncle Jeff's Jeep when we were in high school dating and have always said that we would have one, just for fun. We have some really good friends that happened to have one they wanted to sale and so long story short, I bought the Jeep with out Richard knowing a thing about it. He had actually looked at the Jeep several times before but we never got real serious about buying it. Sam and Jen were such great elves/helpers that they helped keep it a secret for two months and then made the whole thing perfect on Christmas morning as well. Thanks guys.

I was excited, the boys were excited, Richard was excited, surprised and a little in shock. I think his Dad was too! He couldn't believe that I bought a Jeep with out Richard knowing about it!! Oh how much fun is Christmas?
We had a wonderful Christmas morning at our house.

Grandma and Grandpa Pay opening some of their gifts

Grandma and Grandpa Phillips opening theirs

And then we headed to open our gifts from Grandma & Grandpa Phillips!
Clayton thought it was great

Duncan was just happy to have more presents to open

And he loved what he got- a real Duster

Clayton got a wiggle car and tractors
Now each of them have a wiggle car courtesy of Grandma & Grandpa
which means lots of racing around the kitchen!

We finished off our day visiting Grandma & Grandpa Pay's and the boys each got a set of Tonka trucks
from them. Of course the batteries went dead in the camera, so we have video of that:)

Duncan took this picture of us. He was so insistent on taking a picture of us and he did a great job.
We all had a very nice Christmas and are so thankful for our family, friends and the wonderful season of Christmas, especially the reason for it and the many blessings that we have.

It is tradition to take a picture of everyone with their Christmas so here are this year's pictures