Christmas in the Desert

I did not miss having a white Christmas one bit! It was so nice to talk a walk around the neighborhood on Christmas Day without putting on boots and scarves. I think I'd settle for palm trees and the Arizona desert every year.

Our Christmas celebrations started with watching my parents play the Christmas Eve church prelude music on recorder and cello. Blake clapped exuberantly after each song, and was content until he found the Toys for Tots pile of toys in the foyer. How do you explain that the toys are being saved for the less fortunate to a two-year-old with googly eyes? We came home and unwrapped our traditional matching pajama pants, read "Twas the Night Before Christmas," and played a few games which are too embarrassing to reveal. I will say that our annual Christmas march around the house put Blake into hysterics, as did quickly passing presents around in a circle. Another Christmas tradition that my brother and I kept up this year was hanging odd items on the beautifully decorated tree. In the past we have adorned my mom's perfectly color-coordinated tree with items such as kitchen utensils, yarn, sticky notes, and stamp pads. This year, we threw all of Blake's blocks and small toys onto the tree. In the end, the tree didn't even look that tacky which was our original aim. It just looked very bright with primary colors.

Blake was such a delight on Christmas morning. We ate a big breakfast before tackling the piles and piles of presents. Blake was really shoveling in the food and asking for seconds, thirds, and fourths, until we asked him if he wanted to open presents. He immediately ripped off his bib and exclaimed "All Done!" He not only unwrapped his huge stack of presents, but most of our gifts as well. His birthday was great practice for this grand event because once he got started he wanted to tear off every last shred of wrapping paper! It took us 3 long hours to get through the unwrapping. I don't know how we are going to fit everything in the car to bring back home, but we are sure enjoying our presents!

I had some time on my hands so instead of posting a plethora of pictures and video clips, I combined them all into "Our Christmas in Two Minutes."