Christmas Day

Our Christmas started out pretty dramatically.  Stacy, Grandma and Grandpa Wyland were supposed to fly in from Arizona on Christmas Eve afternoon.  Their plane got delayed twice and then eventually cancelled until the next day.  The major problem was that they were flying out of a small airport with only one airline.  Had they been at the Phoenix airport, they probably would have been able to just jump on another flight.  Unfortunately that wasn't the case and they were a bit stranded out there with not much to do.  Long story short, with about 4 cell phones and 2 computers working on the problem, they were able to get a flight out of Phoenix instead and arrived in Portland around 4:30 on Christmas Day.  Our day ended up being a little longer than usual but it was still a great day and they made it.

On Christmas Eve, Megan was very excited to leave cookies that we made earlier in the day and milk for Santa. In fact the first thing she said when she woke up Christmas Day was, "Santa eat his cookies all?"

As was tradition in our house growing up, Megan picked a spot to lay her stocking and for Santa to leave all of her presents.

"Right here Santa!"

Megan woke up around 5:00 a.m. on Christmas Day but we had her go back to sleep, and then we couldn't go back to sleep.  So we were up and getting things ready.  Around 6:30 or so she woke up again and we let her get up.  She wanted to know if Santa had come yet and was very excited when I told her he had.  Santa ate some of his cookies and milk which Megan thought was pretty cool.  He also left a note.  He said Rudolph was wondering if she went potty on the potty chair yet and she immediately said, "No."

Megan's loot from Santa

Santa left a candy cane trail from her room to all of her presents.

Picking up the candy canes and trying to peek.

At this point she still hadn't seen all of her presents, she was just concerned with all of the candy canes on the floor.

He at the cookie!

Megan picked up the letter and went and put it on the refrigerator before anyone could even read it to her.  I guess she thought it was something to save!

One of the many facial expressions of the day.

This video is a little long but it is good all the way through!  She just makes us laugh all the time with the things she says.

Once she got through all of her Santa presents she got to open ones from under the tree.  She got a Barney doll and video from Grandpa and Grandma T.  She loved it!

She got a bunch of clothes from Mom and Dad, which she ended up being more interested in than I thought she would be.

Daddy and Megan went out to the garage to get something to help open one of Megan's toys which I didn't think anything of.  Then Megan walked in with a very familiar jewelry store bag!  Josh and I made a deal that we wouldn't get each other anything for Christmas this year, we had both bought ourselves some things we wanted so we didn't feel the need.  Well, he didn't hold up to his end of the bargain!  It was a very pretty ring for my right hand that he picked out all by himself.  It's being sized right now!

Once Megan had a nap, we made our way over to Grandma and Grandpa's house.  We waited for Stacy and the grandparents to arrive and we sat down for dinner which of course was really, really good.  After cleaning up a bit, we started opening presents.  Megan was a little helper Santa and handed out presents to everyone.

Megan's first gift was from Tami and Devin.  It was a dollhouse and she was VERY excited!

She got a really soft stuffed puppy dog from Grandma and Grandpa Wyland.

Giving hugs for her present.

A jump rope from Gamma and Papa

Putting together her dollhouse with Papa.  Once she opened it, she wasn't very interested in anything else going on.

Cutest present ever!

All of the girls got scarves from Gamma that she knitted herself.

I personally think I had the best Christmas ever.  My first gift was a DVD with pictures from our wedding, and then a framed wedding picture and THEN a scrapbook with all of my wedding pictures!  If you know me, you probably know that I was not very happy with my wedding pictures.  So unhappy that they are still at this time in the proof album, untouched and all unprinted.  I still find it interesting that the photographer has never called to get it back, probably because he knows I wasn't happy.  I won't get into all of the details right now but long story short, it made me more sad than anything else to look at the pictures because they did not reflect the feeling or anything else of our wedding.  I never would have been able to put them in an album myself because I have so much animosity and sadness over the whole thing.  I had no idea how to make them look beautiful. Tami knew this and took it upon herself to create something I never would have been able to.  She has such a talent for it and is so creative.  It turned out beautiful, amazing and something to be proud of.  I started crying big time when I saw the album and told her that because of it, I wouldn't be embarassed anymore to show people our wedding pictures.  It really is wonderful.  So next time you're over, ask to see my wedding pictures!

I had a huge box under the tree that I had no idea what it could have been.  Once I had opened all of Tami's gifts and the big box was brought to me, I had sort of an idea.  My mom had put my wedding dress in a preservation box.  This is something else that I'm not sure if I ever would have gotten around to!  It's been hanging in one of my mom's closets ever since the wedding almost 4 years ago.  It was great to see it again and I am so thankful that it is now taken care of and will be safe for years to come. Unfortunately I didn't get a picture of that.

Thank you everyone for such a great and thoughtful Christmas.  It meant so much to me and I'll have reminders of it all over my house now.