12.23.2010

Our "Christmas Morning" 2010

I think I am still just a kid at heart! I can never sleep the night before Christmas, whenever that might be. So this year was no different, I couldn't sleep and woke up super early. Oh well, it gave me time to get ready, drink some coffee and finish readying the house for our fun morning. While we were waiting for Zach, Meg and the boys, David, Ashley, Emma, Larry and I had some time to drink some coffee! Emma loved this rug in our kitchen. She kept going over to it and talking to the snowmen! I love this picture of her and her daddy! David is a good little daddy!!!
I should go ahead and explain, this blog will have lots of pictures! I couldn't narrow it down anymore than this! There were just so many sweet ones!
First order of business once we were all together...I just had to have some sweet "under the tree" pictures of the four grands in their new Christmas PJ's. I have to admit, I had moments of being afraid the PJ's we made wouldn't fit but they all fit perfectly and I think they looked so precious!!! I couldn't NOT have done the sewing this year without Larry's help. He was so great to help me figure out how to make the patterns bigger and smaller in order to fit 4 different little ones. I am a little challenged when it comes to resizing a pattern!!! :) Here is my favorite picture of our adorable little ones!!
Next, I recruited some little elves to help pass out all the gifts! The boys love this job, getting to divide the gifts up into piles!
Here are a few of my favorites: First up, our oldest grandson, Owen.

Then comes Clay, our second grandchild.


Next up is Will, our third grandchild.


Then comes our youngest, Emma Grace.


I have to include just a few random ones also. One thing that was so precious, is how intrigued Emma was with all the trucks, guns, etc. She would open her gifts, but quickly crawl over to one of the boys to check out the boy gifts!

We let the kids open their gifts first, then had a big breakfast with all our favorite breakfast casseroles! Yum! At each person place on the breakfast table is another one of our traditions, giving each person or couple a new ornament for their tree.





Stockings are a big deal at our house. A few years ago, we started just doing "big" stockings for the adults. Of course, it isn't always possible to get everything in the stocking...as we say at the Knight house, sometimes the stockings just kind of "burp"!
Anyway, here are a few pictures of the crew opening their treats! We love stocking time! I need to apologize. We always share pictures and I haven't had a chance to load all the ones that Ashley took, so I don't have one of everyone loaded yet! Sorry David and Will!!! Plus, I don't have any of Larry and I opening our stockings...but let me just say that our children did amazing stockings for us this year! So many fun goodies!!!



One thing that is so sweet, is how excited the little ones are to watch their parents open their stocking!

The last "gift" of this year was something Larry and I were VERY excited about. We first just talked about how very blessed we are as a family and how we truly don't "need" anything. We wanted to give our kids a chance to spend the afternoon giving to others! We gave each family some money in a envelope and told them they were to go out for the afternoon and bless others! When they returned they shared with everyone what ways they found to use the money! It was so cool! Zach, Meg and the boys put together care packages to give out to the homeless! They even made enough to share with David, Ashley, Larry and I! They felt this was a way for their boys to be a part of the giving. The kids are noticing homeless people on the street corners and have been asking questions so now they have a way of giving them something to hopefully keep them warm and help supply a few of their needs. David and Ashley visited the pediatric ward at Hendricks and discovered another real need. The nurses talked about how often they send kids home from the hospital in hospital gowns because the kids don't have PJ's, socks, underwear or blankets. David and Ashley went to Wal-Mart and bought supplies for the nurses to at least give a child something new to wear home! Zach, Meg, Larry and I were so touched by the needs the hospital had, they we went back to Wal-Mart and bought some more items to take to them. Our kids blew us away with their giving spirits!! They were so excited about this "activity" and we all decided it would be a tradition every year!! Really, that is truly what Christmas is about!!! I hesitated whether to blog about this part of our Christmas because I don't want this to come across bragging! However, very few read my blog anyway and this is just my way of journaling our family events.

It goes without saying that our time together was sweet and full of memories that I will treasure up in my heart. Our time together is never long enough but I am just so thankful that when we are together we always have tons of fun, the house is full of laughter and we leave longing for more!!! We love you all and are so thankful for family time!

2 comments:

Kayla said...

Great pictures. What a cute family! And I don't think your post sounded braggy at all. I'm glad you shared your idea; it's something I'd love to do in our family.

Kim said...

That is a wonderful idea, Mary Kay!! I love it! Thanks for sharing. I think that is great. And one other thing...you are going to have to teach me to sew so that I can make my kids matching PJs and all that fun stuff! ;)