Before going to bed last night I decided that we should read the nativity from the scriptures to the kids, and we kind of acted it out with the little people nativity set. I thought that maybe the visual of playing it out with the nativity would help keep the little kids interested.
When we were all done reading the story, the kids got to pick out a stocking and lay them on the couch and then it’s time to go to bed (so the little kids don’t walk off with the stockings and lose them).
Christmas morning the kids woke up bright and early as usual. The big kids usually wake up the earliest because they have the most excitement, then they are so loud about their excitement that they eventually wake the little ones up.
Kyle and I finally decided that they weren’t going to settle down any time soon and we had tortured them with the waiting long enough, so we got up and grabbed the camera to get ready to go out to the living room. Where we found NOTHING! The tree, the stockings, the Santa, and the nativity and every other Christmas decoration were all GONE!
The kids did not take it very well at all. Obviously Santa wouldn’t play a trick like this, so maybe the Grinch got to our house first. Honestly, as Christmas was approaching, the kids behavior and their lack of obedience and care for the things they have, in addition to our financial situation (due to Kyle’s unemployment and new job situation) has made it to where I had NO desire to get anything for any of the kids. I also felt like I didn’t want to just NOT have Christmas because that isn’t fair to the little ones who really don’t know better. So I was torn between just doing Christmas anyway or just doing nothing. The Grinch took care of that for me.
We did discover that the Grinch hadn’t taken everything, as we originally thought. He just moved it downstairs, where Santa finished his part.
The kids were relieved to find that Christmas was simply moved to the basement.
We let the kids play around with the stuff and eat the candy in their stockings for awhile. Adam got very chocolatey:
We took a break to come upstairs and eat breakfast. I remember Christmas as a kid, we would just eat our candy all day long, and wouldn’t actually have a meal until Christmas dinner in the early evening. Eating candy all day long, just makes you feel sick! So I insist on serving breakfast on Christmas morning before we start opening presents.
For presents this year, we let the kids draw names so they had somebody else to choose a gift for. I was hoping that having to think about what someone else might like, would help with the selfishness that has been going on lately. Also, when Kyle and I went shopping, we didn’t get anything for anybody specific. We only got things that could be used by everyone and they were mostly educational.
We spent the afternoon sitting around, while most of the kids played with the new things. Lydia loves the new giant Minnie Mouse so much that she used it as a bed:
Later in the evening Debby, Jeff and Rexton came over. We let them open their presents, and we had sandwiches with our favorite deli meats and cheeses dinner. We finished the evening by going back downstairs to watch Kyle and Jeff (and some of the kids) play a new video game that Kyle had received.