We had a total blast on Christmas Eve this year!  The girls got in their Christmas pajamas right after naps and couldn’t wait for the evening to unfold!

 

I told the girls to look for Santa, so they went to the window and held hands.  It was the sweetest thing!  They didn’t know he really was going to come until he got here!  We then took our traditional stair step picture, like we do before anything special.  I wonder when they’ll all the be same height.  Can we just freeze time?  These ages are amazing!  No toddlers (well, almost), no teenagers, our house is rockin’! 

 

Poppa and Rara got here just in time for our surprise guest to arrive!

 

I asked them one more time to go check and see if Santa is here, and to their amazement, he actually was!!! 

Reading Christmas stories was so very special!

Rose’s turn to tell Santa a secret.  We have two very special memories of Rose from tonight.  After story time, Rose showed Santa a little tiny jingle bell that she had (which is around her neck in this picture), and said, “Watch this!” and rang it as loudly as she could.  Then Santa reached into his bag and pulled out 3 bells quadruple in size, and said, “Watch this!” and shook his!  They were having so much fun playing together!  Then Santa asked Rose what she wanted for Christmas.  I kid you not, Rose returned his question with a question, “What do you have?”  We were cracking up!  Rose is a bag of tricks.  You never know what’s going to come out of her mouth, but it’s always something so great!

 

Up next was Anna Kate.  She is the cutest little 5 year old I could think up!  She got in his lap and said hi and then started to climb down.  I think she didn’t want to take up his time or something.  I’m not quite sure.  Maybe she was a little bashful.  Whatever the case, he said, “Not so fast!  Where are you going?”  She hopped back up and could not stop giggling.  She would never ask for extra attention, but she basks in it.  She is probably the opposite of most middle children.  She was the happiest little baby, and aside from normal kid phases, she is absolutely amazing!

I love Anna Kate’s hands holding Santa’s thumb, so precious and sweet!  We are so honored to have Santa Chuck Lee, the only real Santa as the girls like to tout, as our family friend.  He is truly our friend and helps raise my spirits when the going gets tough.  We care about each other and that makes our visits so very special!

 

Noelle saw Rose telling secrets with Santa, and she had a silly secret too!  Hers was, “I like broccoli!”  Santa whispered back to her that he liked it too!  Noelle is so little and so big!  It makes me so very happy and sad!  She’s growing up, and I’m trying to freeze all of our moments together.  She’s such a great kid, and I’m so proud of her!

 

She really cracked herself up!  She is thankful Santa Chuck has been there for her during her childhood.  We will treasure our memories together forever and ever! 

 

Another amazing Christmas memory was hearing Santa recite ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas from memory.  He spins the tale with drama and life!  It’s so much fun to hear!

 

When Santa left the room for a second, someone saw his coat hanging on his chair.  She could not help herself!  It looked too fancy not to try on!  Wouldn’t you know Noelle would be very interested in Santa’s wardrobe.  That made her night!  She kept twirling and spinning around.  After Santa was off to the busiest night of his year, we got busy making his gingerbread cookies!

Rara helped the girls get started!

 

 

Mike made our traditional homemade pizza from scratch.  He is such a great chef!  He could seriously cook for a living if he wanted to.  I’m so proud of my man!

 

After dinner, we opened a few special presents the girls had worked on this year!  Mike got a little trophy from Anna Kate that said, “#1 Dad.”  She was so proud to give her family members presents this year. 

 

Poppa got a fishing magnet, and Anna Kate and Rose got model magic from their sweet Aunt Joe!

 

Rose got Uni the Unicorn book recommended by Aunt Sharon from her Daddy this year!  She is so crazy about it, and we have probably read it one hundred times already.  It softened the blow of not getting a real live unicorn in the back yard for Christmas, God love her!

 

Noelle gave Mike a keychain and socks, which he really needed, and I gave Mom a crochet trivet I made for her this fall with Mrs. Rose, our lively crochet teacher and friend.  It sure was a labor of love, but I finished it just in time.  That project went with me to lots of soccer and cheer practices this fall!  She loved it, and I was so happy to have kept a secret from her!

 

Last but not least, it was time to sprinkle reindeer food in the yard to help guide them to our house.  Little did we know at the time, Mike and I would be up till the wee hours of night helping Santa assemble all of the Pond girls’ toys.  Next year (and the year after that and the year after that), we’re buying technology or something that doesn’t need to be built, but we are so happy we paid it forward tonight for loads of fun for years to come!