Christmas Time

The Sunday before Christmas we got the kids all dressed in their Christmas duds and attempted to take a decent picture. 

We got some not so decent pictures...

And a couple more decent-ish ones.

Since Johann was home he decided it was time to get Henry to finally ride a bike. Henry was very much against it and refused to even try. We kept trying to explain to him why it was a good idea to ride one but the thing that finally got him was explaining he might have to ride a bike on his mission. "But why can't I walk or have a car?!" Once we convinced him it is entirely possible he went for it and after 30 minutes one day and 10 a day later he was off and loved it. 

Thea joined in on her tricycle.

While all the cars were moved from the driveway we lowered the basketball hoop and played.

 Turns out Henry seems to like basketball. Maybe we'll try that with him later.


One morning we treated ourselves to breakfast with the kids where I use to go when I was little. It's not as good as I remember it, but maybe my taste buds developed a bit since then. The kids really liked it nonetheless.

The morning before my two brothers and sister-in-law got here my mom was putting together the chicken taquitos and made chicken noodle soup with the left over stock and it was the.best. chicken noodle soup-EVER. I ate it for breakfast and lunch.

That night once everyone got into town we had some Nicks Pizza and watched Home Alone. 

Henry set a trap for anyone who might want to burgle the house that night...

He also tied flies with Uncle Hamp before heading to bed. 

Christmas Eve morning we held our first annual Goodwin family gingerbread house decorating competition. Thea was pretty stoked to see all the candy out on the table.

Thea, Johann and I teamed up, Hamp and Henry teamed up and everyone else had their own. Johann mostly ate the candy (he did help open some for me), Thea helped on the roof then went the way of her daddy.

These were the five options voted on by our fb friends without who made which:

This was the winner made my me, Thea and (kind of) Johann ;-)

Late afternoon we had our delicious mexican dinner and empanada's provided by a woman from Paraguay in our ward. My younger brother went there on his mission and when she talked to him (he picked them  up from her) she also had him come back and get more Paraguayan food she made for him. He was preeetty happy.

After dinner, we did our first reading of Luke 2 and Nativity 'play' planned and carried out by Henry and Aunt Annie. It was nice and I hope we can do it again some time.

We cleaned up then Grammy passed out Christmas PJs.

Leo tried to open them with his mouth.

Henry got a little tired and grumpy so Thea helped me make the cookies for Santa.

Henry later came out of his room and helped get the carrots and cookies arranged on the plate and wrote a note for Santa.

Then the kiddies went to bed and Santa came.

Uncle Hamp's fire was a little to fierce and Santa was afraid the candies would melt so he put the stockings down. Thanks, Santa, thanks.

Christmas morning the kids got up at a fairly decent time, (6:30ish) and were excited to see Santa had come.

Leo kept sleeping and I was afraid he would miss his first Christmas, but thankfully he woke up just in time! 

and commenced to try and eat his way into each present we handed him. He was way more into Christmas and the presents than Henry or Thea during their first Christmas, he reached out for every gift and tried to play with everything we helped him open. It was so fun to watch.

Aaron prides himself on getting Henry some type of weapon every Christmas (usual foam swords) but Henry told him he didn't want anymore. Aaron pretended he did get him a sword but it was actually a shovel, something Henry is actually really excited about for all his outside projects. He did get him this awesome and hilarious contraption-the bugzooka, to suck up bugs and check 'em out.

Thea had a much harder time with opening gifts, she got a little overwhelmed and eventually asked if she could just go watch a show in her room, haha.

Then we got all dressed and ready to head to Grandpa and Abuela's for the rest of the day.

Thea loved her doggy sweater and the light up mini mouse shoes Henry picked out for her. Henry picked for Thea, Thea for Leo and Leo for Henry. It was fun to do that this year too.

Present opening with uncle Kaleb and cousin Apollo.

Johann and Henry thought it would be funny to get me these finger puppet/magnets, Tolstoy, Chekhov and Dostoyevsky. The present said it was from, "The three merry men."

Cousin Jackson brought them some suckers.

And Aunt Anne and Thea were coordinated.

Johann's cousin fried two turkeys, one regular and one with cajun seasoning and Johann's mom made a ham. We had a lot of people there but it was still a lot of food! We had fun visiting with everyone and enjoyed all the yummy food. It was a very Merry Christmas day!