Perhaps if you are lucky, one day you too can have five Christmases

I said four before but now that I think about it, my boys had five:

1) Pre-departure, Delaware Christmas
2) Christmas Eve at Meemaw and Poppop's
3) Christmas morning at Mamaw and Dadaw's
4) A trip to Missouri the weekend following Christmas where we opened presents at Grandma Peetz's house and then
5) attended a party/present-opening for the Ross side of the family at my Aunt Cindy's.

1) Delaware Christmas
We had originally intended to stay put for Christmas morning and to make a big to-do of the present opening and Santa's part in the production. But Dada and I are the kind of people who can't keep gifts to ourselves. Once they are in the house, what's the point of not playing with them? So we told the boys that they had been so good this year, Santa was going to visit our house every night the week before Christmas and drop off a new present for them. But it wasn't just for the boys, no. Being in such thick cahoots with Santa, we understood his Christmas Eve workload and wanted to help out a bit.

Here they are opening their first present (a ginormous Tinkertoy set) right after Dada got off of work one day.


Then we went to Indiana for our annual spoiling from both sets of grandparents, who surely have the local economy in mind when they set out to buy for my boys.

2) Christmas Eve at Meemaw and Poppop's
...was different this year; we opened presents in the TV room instead of the Christmas Tree Room because of our beloved, gimptacular Poppop:



See that metal pole lying across his belly? That's a stocking stuffer from Meemaw, one of those extend-your-reach grabby devices for moldy convalescents such as himself. She loves him so.

Here comes Isaac, full of purpose, marching in to claim his birthright:



I love this picture because it wraps up everything that is my life right now -- a preschooler full of attitude leading the way, with me lagging behind under the weight of my omnipresent hip-candy. Oh, and that I am kept alive only by coffee.

Meemaw in her festiveness ensured that everyone was topped with a Santa hat...




...though eventually some of us lost the hats because they distracted from the important duties of the Toy Inspectors:



To be continued. Until then, please enjoy a slideshow of our Christmases across the Midwest.