christmas 2008

just as we all suspected, the ginger bread cookies she helped doug bake from scratch had been eaten, the cup of milk was empty and a crumpled up tissue paper had been tossed onto the empty plate which had only a quarter of a cookie left. she was semi-concerned of why santa did not finish all two of the cookies we offered for him - we explained to her that he had a LOT of cookies to eat last night while visiting everyone's house all over the world.

she then went into series of questions like, "how can he fit all those presents in that one bag of his?" and, "can santa hear what i'm thinking al the time?" as well as my favourite, "who has more power? santa or god?"

the questions stopped when she suddenly realized all the gifts that santa had left, not just under the tree, but in our stockings as well as three additional new stockings, also filled to the brim, left on our couch...

i think she was about to burst with excitement right before diving into the stocking stuffers (as traditional each year, we start off with those first, ending with the gifts from friends and then family).

i noticed this year around, it didn't take nearly as long for her to unwrap all the gifts. i guess, being older, she's more efficient at whipping and tearing through the wrapping paper. and she was pretty good at not stopping too long to play with each toy she unwrapped.

well, other then her and doug trying to figure out how to turn optimus prime into a truck...

it was just after 11am after we finished unwrapping all the gifts (except from my parents and my aunt/uncle, which we did when we saw them for the later half of the day). doug and i went into the kitchen and started to prepare breakfast. with starbuck's christmas blend coffee in the pot, we made some cheesy scrambles on top of buttered tatty-scons, as well as a side of sliced blood pudding. yum! it was a semi-scottish brunch (semi because we had cheesy scrambles rather then poached eggs).

after brunch, we sat around in the living room, allowing ourselves to take a closer look at our presents. doug read his new harry potter book while i did my favourite thing - organize everyone's presents into piles under the tree. i have this insane need to get some of the more worn-out christmas gift bags and putting each person's loot into their own gift bag. it's just easier - when it's time to clean up, all the little things are already in a bag, ready to be taken away.

chaeli went for a 3pm nap and was down for an hour (which was a good thing if she wanted to stay up late). my parents arrived about half an hour later which gave us plenty of times to exchange presents before heading over to my aunt's/uncle's place for dinner.

at around 6pm, we went across the underground parking lot and was greeted with a 21lb turkey that just came fresh out of the oven. it was unbelievably huge. but what was even more unbelievable was that we actually ate half of that damn turky. HALF! crazy! and i had three servings of turkey myself. i had all the side dishes, too, but didn't go back for 2nds/3rds other then to have more of that yummy, juicy, white-meat.

my aunt's christmas decorations is always so beautiful. she's got a very classy taste and her tree is usually coloured with either a light, warm pink and gold or bright red and gold. this year, she chose the latter.

after dinner, we did our last and final round of gift exchanges. i was pleased that everyone liked what i picked out for them, since i make it a goal to get at least one thing that would make each person very happy.

cheali posed infront of the tree in her preppy outfit i picked out for her for dinner time. we chatted throughout the night until close to 11:30pm before saying heading off.

another year, another christmas.