Christmas Eve

We got home from Israel super late the night before Christmas Eve.  We had all planned on sleeping in, but after waking up so early every day during our time in Israel, our body clocks decided to wake us up at the crack of dawn.  I took advantage of that & made some homemade muffins, muddy buddy mix, & some snowman cake pops all before 7:30am.

Most of Christmas Eve was catching up on groceries, laundry, picking up mail (thankfully the last few presents came just in time), wrapping gifts, & just getting things ready for Christmas.  We played a few boardgames as a family, baked some yummy treats to eat, & watched some Christmas movies.

I made Tostadas for dinner (at the request of the kids) & after dinner we played a fun cup game I threw together at the last minute since I didn't have time to make a saran wrap ball this year.  I put out a bunch of red cups on the table & placed some surprises underneath them.  Some had money under them, some had candy, & some had NOTHING.  One cup had a "surprise" under it & whomever got that one would get a special something.

The kids loved it.  I don't know how Canyon manages to luck out in games like these, but he always winds up with all the money for some reason (it's the same at Easter time when I put money in the eggs too!).  We were cracking up every time someone got NOTHING in their cup, but then Canyon would grab one & there'd be MORE money in it.

Lorien got the "special surprise!"  The surprise was a whipped cream santa beard which everyone thought was hilarious.

After the game, we went upstairs to watch A Muppet Christmas Carol before bed, & while we were watching, Santa must have slipped inside the house & put pajamas on our beds.  The kids heard sleigh bells & rushed around the house to try to find him, & found all our new pajamas on our beds.

After the movie, the kids made a plate of goodies for Santa, then went straight to bed.  I filled the stockings (Santa doesn't fill the stockings, I do), then we went to bed too.