Letters from the Evans: Christmas Adventures Part 5: Christmas Morning :)

A rather sleeplessness night inspired the following poem written by me with creative input by Bryan:

'Twas the night before Christmas and all through our house

Every creature was crying (including my spouse)!

The stockings were hung by the chimney with care,

But "nothing they'll get without peace!" I declare.

The children were tossing and turning in bed,

Stalling with moans and tears being shed.

Daddy in his socks and Mom in her sweats

Stare helplessly at the ceiling and scowl at their pets.

At this point they hope that there is a clatter,

That Santa really would come and see what's the matter.

That maybe he will bake the cookies himself

And as for assembling the dollhouse? assign an elf!

Mom and Dad could grab earplugs and get some needed sleep,

And Santa would stay until from the girls there's no peep.

Then tomorrow we'll wake and see what they got,

Which is bound to be better than the original "naught."

However, what do you know!? Santa still came! Perhaps it was too late to move our girls to the Naughty List :)

At first I thought Santa didn't do very well getting the girls even numbers of gifts, but then we discovered that all of Clara's wrapped gifts go WITH the dollhouse, and Emma's wrapped gift goes with several of the gifts she was given by relatives! Santa is so smart.

Due to the aforementioned restless night our girls actually slept much later than usual. Emma woke up several times, but her last sleep stretch lasted until just a little after 8am! Nice. We allowed to get to sneak peek while waiting for Clara to rouse. (It was Emma Lou's very first Christmas after all!) Don't worry, she didn't do any damage with her sister-in-crime.

Clara woke up around 8:30 ready to see what "Santa Cwaus" brought in the night!

Side note: Clara was SUPER creeped out by the idea of someone coming down the chimney at night so we had to write a letter to leave on the front door asking Santa to please leave the gifts on the front porch during the night and Mommy and Daddy would get them in the morning.

Her eyes LIT UP when she saw the doll house.

Exploring

Emma was intrigued and excited by the musical monkey, aptly nicknamed "Night night Monkey" by Clara because it plays soothing music. I finally figured out how to switch it between the "short" setting and "long" setting, so we'll be trying that out to see if it helps at nap and night times soon.

Opening her wrapped gift with a little help from Dada

Clara likes to do it all by herself

I wish I had thought to brush her hair! But she was having far too much fun to step away and find a brush :)

A car to go in the dollhouse garage and a park for the kids to play out! Every doll person got a chance to go "weeeee weeee" on the swing :) but "Papa" wasn't allowed on the slide. I never did figure out why. He did get to drive though.

Clara drove from the house to barn over and over and over. She was "visiting the ranch to moo at cows and see WooWoo and Papa and Mowwy"

Showing Emma how everything works

Emma had to fight for a chance to play all by herself. But sneaky girl that she is, she hijacked a couple of doll people to play with while Clara commandeered the barn ;) Sukey, sukey little dude!

[Marissa: add sukey to the Meloy vocabulary list with pedibakah and boquitus]

Eating Dada's hair and listening to the tractor's "Old MacDonald" song on repeat :)

Emma does this relatively new thing where she sucks in her lips and lets them pop as kind of a pseudo kiss for things that make her happy. She did that several times to the Night Night Monkey when it played her a song.

Notice that the grandmother doll and the horse are laying on their faces in the field behind her, hehe

I had to run upstairs to grab something and couldn't believe the way our living room looked when I came back down. Be still my stressed out heart. Thankfully they were having a ball and could be cleaned up later!

Having so much fun

Clara was really concerned that the baby didn't have a carseat when they went for a drive, so she stuck the stroller in and it was all okay. (Which reminds me: Did I tell y'all about how worried she was that Baby Jesus was naked in his carseat - manager - on his "Happy Day"? I love her imagination!)

Drove back to the barn to say hello

Rearranging furniture and parking the car in the garage

By this time I made the green bean casserole and Bryan popped it in the oven while I got the girls dressed and ready because it was almost time to go to MeMaw and Paw's house for Christmas lunch!

I finished fixing Clara's hair only to have her put on her bicycle helmet (why not?), and she decided she needed to fix my hair for me too.

"Turn around Mama; Hold still!"

My already dry hair was even drier when she was finished with me! Thanks Clara!

I finally convinced her to have a tea party with little sister while I went to actually fix my hair and get dressed myself :) She was ready to pour me a cup when I returned.

Thanks for the tea set Lulu!

I took a few snapshots of the girls before we left because I was just seriously overwhelmed by how sweet they are together. They drive me batty sometimes, but they are also polite, kind, adorable and smart little girls and I love them so much.