Truly Magical

I'm a sucker for traditions so when Ed put the kibosh on matching family Christmas pajamas I was heartbroken, to say the least. Although Pearl, Ed and I didn't get new pajamas I couldn't deprive the kiddos from their traditional gift on Christmas Eve. That morning Wes was the first to notice the 3 presents under the tree and his eyes lit up:

Tenley quickly ripped opened her present, while the twins were much more sluggish with theirs:

Linds and Isla surprised us with a visit and came barring gifts:

(Thanks guys!!)

The kids played for a minute and even practiced some of their dance moves:

After the twins napped and Tenley "relaxed" a.k.a. laid in bed with her iPad, I got the kids dressed and they looked as cute as could be for their first and fourth Christmas Eve dinner (can you believe that?!):

Since I made the potato filling for the pierogies Tuesday night, Ed rolled out the dough while I played and watched 'Frozen' with the kids:

As much as I'd love to, we don't do the traditional Christmas Eve Italian Feast (fishes, pasta, wine, etc.) with a touch of Polish pierogies like my family back home, but I try to do just enough to keep the traditions alive and for it to feel like Christmas for us; which is super important since we're so far away from our loved ones. I think when the kids are older and can help cook we'll bring back the entire traditional feast, but for now the kids loved their feast of honey baked ham and pierogies:

After dinner we did some more light-seeing and ever brought Pearl along for the ride; which really had Tenley overjoyed:

We came across this one house that had green lasers pointing up in the tree; which made it look like it had a million twinkling green lights. Tenley thought TinkerBell lived in the tree. I should've gotten out to take a picture because these pictures just do not show it well enough- it was gorgeous:

We also went to this house that was on a list that was posted on Facebook for the '15 of The Best Las Vegas Neighborhood Christmas Holiday Light Shows' and this one was by far our family's favorite:

After putting the kids to bed, I made my traditional egg soufflé casserole so it could sit over night and be ready to pop in the oven in the morning:

Sure enough as soon as breakfast was taken care of Santa decided to visit our house! He and his reindeers ate the snacks that Tenley left out for him and filled our living room with tons of gifts for the kids:

The twins woke up around 7am so we woke Tenley up to open presents and she was so excited. When we walked out to the living room she immediately saw Wes' big present from Santa, Thomas the Train, and started riding around the track:

After a few circles around the track, it was time to open presents:

This was one of Tenley's singing Elsa dolls that she so desperately wanted from Santa:

And this is the second Elsa singing doll that Santa brought her (because she was just such a good girl, duh!):

Thomas was a BIG hit and surprisingly Wes is really good at getting on and off by himself. Big Boy loves his train:

Each kid got a ride-on toy from Santa- Wes got Thomas the Train, Ev got the Frozen mobile and T got a princess scooter or as she calls it a "zippy scooter". So look out 'cause this crew is cruising around recklessly: 

The twins were exhausted from playing with all their new toys so they took great naps while Tenley had "quiet time". Once everyone was recharged, we decided to get dressed even though we were just having dinner at home. Before we sat down to eat our delicious pasta and meatballs with wedding soup we decided to take our family Christmas photo by our tree. I've been asking Santa for a tripod for years now, but he has yet to deliver (too busy making Elsa singing dolls, I suppose!). We created a tower with the couch and ottoman and put the camera on self-timer and the babies kept looking at the tree and every time they did look the picture just so happened to be blurry. We had to put the Elsa singing doll by the camera to keep their attention. We seriously tried everything...it is hard when no one is behind the lens! It made for great memories though because we were cracking up and it turns out I ended up getting 1 with everyone looking:

Then, I quickly snapped some quick shots of my handsome men:

After dinner, Tenley played with all of her new kitchen toys and looked cute as could be:

Wes had such a long day that he partied his clothes off:

Our first Christmas as a family of 5 was amazing! Seeing Christmas through your children's eyes never gets old- it's truly magical and a real reminder of how blessed we are. We are fortunate to have God in our lives, each other, our health and have Santa bless our kiddies with way too many presents than they need or I wish to have in the house. It was definitely a Christmas I will never forget!

Merry Christmas everyone! :)