Christmas #1 and Christmas #2

 A few pictures from our Christmas #1 at Grandma and Khun-Taa's house. Iron man was a hit for our little super hero loving boy.

 Shae parted ways with Superman and gifted it to my dad.

We then flew out to Ibu's where we celebrated Christmas #2--on real Christmas day :). 

Christmas Eve we read Red-Headed Robbie's Christmas Story, Ibu's favorite Christmas book and now one of ours as well. So nice of her to share that beautiful book with us. 

Then Darin read Twas the Night Before Christmas to us. Clearly everyone was really in to it. I was anyway...

 After the kids were in bed and everything was in place I went and hung out in the living room for a few minutes. My favorite part of Christmas is everything that happens from Thanksgiving to Dec. 24th, I've never been a huge fan of the actual day of Christmas. I hate that "the holidays" comes to an end. The anticipation and excitement disappear in an instant. 

I just loved enjoying the silence of this beautiful room, with the snow falling outside, looking at the picture of Christ and the Christus statue over the mantle. Feeling the peace and perfection of this special holiday before the crazy morning fell upon us. 

And while it was fast and crazy, the morning really was wonderful. Shae was beside himself with excitement to see that Santa had eaten his milk and cookies and left him a letter. It was just adorable to watch.

Santa brought them each a Paw Patrol pup to add to their collection (that began the previous week with Grandmas gifts to them).

 We did stockings and the pup Santa gifts before church, then after church opened the presents.

We took Shae to Five Below to pick out a present for Belén, and he picked out her first barbie. Starting young. I know some people have issues with Barbies, but I loved Barbies growing up. They were easily my most played with toy. Bring em' on I say.

Being on vacation for Christmas actually made Christmas day and the days after really nice. I just kept listening to Christmas music and watching Christmas movies and reading Christmas books, because we were still on vacation, so it was clearly still Christmas. It made for a nice transition for me.

Thanks to our wonderful families for making our Christmas so special, and for all the fun gifts we received! We are so lucky.