Christmas Eve Afternoon--Start Here for Your Recaps

I've already blogged about the morning time and our festive brunch and the golf cart...but there's still the rest of the day to discuss.

Once Dalton finally was woken up from his late nap, we bundled up and headed out for some cruisin' in the golf cart:


Eastie's still kinda getting the hang of steering well and staying on the sidewalk. It wasn't too bad, I guess I just have higher expectations. :) We weren't out long at all, it was too chilly, and we came in to warm up. Easton asked for some hot chocolate. This is two seconds before he spilled most of it on himself and the floor:


Jason played a few songs on the guitar and Easton grabbed a tambourine and a marraca and we had a "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree" and "Jingle Bell Rock" sing-a-long. Good times! We also did a little Play-Doh and coloring:








After awhile we decided to let the boys open their one Christmas Eve gift. It's become a tradition to open one gift, and it's always been one from The Alabamaws. This year was no exception. Dalton scored a Baby Elmo with a "Ba Ba":


And Easton got a big Batman action figure...his wings pop out and he has a Batarang he flings:




We got smarter this year and let the boys open their gifts before dinner rather than afterwards where we're like, "Oh cool. Okay, time for bed". This time they got plenty of time to play while I made our Christmas Eve spaghetti dinner. The boys always have to be nakey when we eat spaghetti:








While we cleaned up after dinner, the boys went to play some more with their new toys. We just happened to find them sweetly playing like this:


So cute!


Before long it was time to head up for bed, but not before setting out milk and cookies for ol' St. Nick:




Easton has been asking for weeks to be allowed to sleep in Baby Dalton's room. For Christmas Eve we finally let him. Growing up, my sisters and I always slept in the same room on Christmas Eve, even when I was, like, 20 and Ben was in there with us all. Fun tradition. And the boys started with this Christmas Eve as well. E brought up his new Batman and tucked him in on the Noel pillow on the floor next to his mat:


Then both boys hopped in the sleeping bag for their story, song, and our prayers:


Dalton was having a hard time settling down:


Giving Bubba a good night hug:


We turned out the light and I rocked with Diddles for a bit before saying good night to both of them. It seemed like it was going well, Dalton was in his crib, E was here:


But around 4 a.m. Easton called and I put him in his bed. In the morning he let us know that Dalton's clock was taking too long to get to 7:00. He wanted to be in his room where the clock apparently runs at a more normal speed.

Jason and I did some prep around the tree, loaded up the car with gifts for the extended family, drank some sparkling cider, and called it a night at a very reasonable hour.