Christmas morning!

We had a fantastic Christmas! It's the first year Charlotte really understood what was going on and she was so excited. We spent the entire month of December talking about Santa and Jesus. We decided to keep Santa as a fictional character who visited malls but would not be the gift giver in our home. I think Charlotte would've had nightmares if we told her he was coming into our house. At the beginning of the month, Charlotte got her own Little People Nativity Scene and learned lots of new words like angel, Jesus and manger. She seemed to get that Christmas was Jesus' birthday (as much as she gets the word "Jesus" and "birthday").

We spent the week before Christmas exploring trains in the DC area in hopes that Charlotte would enjoy her main gift. We went to Burke for church with some long time friends on Christmas eve. Charlotte had a great time in the nursery while Cailin (and Matt) paced in the back of the service. We spent some time catching up after the service and got home late. We raced the girls to bed, then pulled out a train table which may as well have come from Ikea. Matt was up very late but the excitement was enough to get him through the following day. We had monkey bread for breakfast which was a tradition when I was a kid.

Then it was time for presents! We spent all morning in our PJs unwrapping gifts. Charlotte actually took 3 days to open all of the presents. Her favorite gifts include sippy cups, the choo choo, and Mr. Potato Heads. Cailin needed some help with her gifts. Charlotte happily unwrapped stuffed animals, a baby doll, and some teethers for her sister. After nap, we cleaned up the house and had some new friends over for dinner. It was a simple way to spend the day and it was simply perfect.