Christmas Celebrating - The Day After Christmas

We woke up early the day after Christmas and had to drive to my parents house.  This was the view as we drove.  It was snowing and sticking, but we didn't have far to go.

We ate breakfast and opened presents at my parents house, but I didn't manage to get many pics there.  However, I did get a picture of just Tatum and Mateo's presents.  It was crazy how many presents they had to open!

As soon as we finished at my parent's house, we headed to celebrate Christmas with my dad's family.  Many people weren't able to be there, but this was the group that day.  My dad had asked us earlier if we could do some group pictures and I am sure glad we did!  We set up our tripod and put the camera on a timer.  It worked great!

There are 4 kids in my dad's family...2 girls and 2 boys just like in our family.  Here he is with his brother and 2 sisters.

And here I am with my brothers and sister.  Matt, me, Laurie, Clif  (Laurie is the oldest, then Clif, Matt, and me)  My parents had 4 kids and 5 years...can you imagine??!?!  I sure can't! 

And here we are with my parents.  I can't remember the last time we have a picture of all of us together.

Then we decided to do family pics.  Here is my sister's family...

And of course, when we tried to do the family picture thing, it ended up like this...

we will get a good family picture one day...I just KNOW it...lol

My brother, Clif, and his wife Jennifer.  They live in Virginia and he is in the Navy, so we don't get to see them too often. 

Matt, my other brother, and his wife Stephanie live in Knoxville.  Mateo (which is Matthew in Spanish) was named after Matt.  I sure wish they lived closer.

And here are my parents.  They survived the 4 of us kids and seem to still be happy. :)

And here are ALL of us.  I think this is a great picture of everyone! 

We did a 'silly face' picture for the kids and this cracks me up everytime I look at it!  My mom and dad HATE 'silly face' pictures, but after looking at this, I LOVE it.  You can really see everyone's personality.  My sis-in-law, Stephanie has her head down and that is so her...just very clever!  Of course, I think she is really praying for help since she is in our crazy family. haha

My parents with the grandkids.  Can you tell Mateo was up 5 hours past his bedtime the night before and was also going on NO NAP??  He was good, just not very into the pictures.

And last but not least, the 'inlaws'...those that chose to be in our family.  haha

Christmas Day 2010 - Part 3

If you are keeping up with me still, after Antonio's parents' house, we then go to my grandmother's house for Christmas dinner.  Can I tell you, this is my FAVORITE MEAL OF THE YEAR!!!!

She always makes breakfast and it is so good!!

And this is why it is my favorite meal of the YEAR!!....

...yep, CHOCOLATE GRAVY!!  I will just go ahead and tell on myself, I made 4 (yes, FOUR) trips to get biscuits with chocolate gravy.  I should feel bad, but I don't. haha
Mya, Mckayla, and Laurie

Tatum helped pass out the gifts to everyone.  Here she is giving my grandmother 'Gran' and her friend James a present.

Tatum has loved VeggieTales since her 1st birthday and she still loves them.  Look at her expression when she got a VeggieTales movie that we don't already have...lol

Here are the four of us again.  Clif, Laurie, me, and Matt

and we were trying to get us with our spouses for a picture, but it was a little crowded and Mateo was wanting his mommy too.

After we finished at my grandmother's house, we got a hotel room in Jackson since there wasn't enough room at my parents' house for all of us.  My sister and her family did the same.  My brothers, sister, all the spouses, and us all hung out playing cards very late before heading to bed.  Tatum, Mateo, and I all stayed up until midnight, but I finally had to take them down to the room and we all went to bed while the rest of the group stayed up a little later.  It was a great night 'like old times'.

Christmas Day 2010 - Part 2

As soon as we got done with Christmas at our house, we had to be at Antonio's parent's house by 10am.  Here is Mateo posing in front of their Christmas tree.

There were so many presents under the tree at Antonio's parents' house.  The family has really grown over the years.

Gabby, Tatum, Caiden, and Mateo

Nana and Pawpaw with the grandkids.

We gave umbrellas to some of the men in the family and we learned that 2 of the guys had never owned an umbrella before the one we gave them.  Here is Chris posing with his 1st umbrella.

and Benardo with his first umbrella ever!

Pawpaw really knows how to put a smile on these girls' faces.  He did his annual giving.

Christmas Day 2010 - Part 1

Christmas Eve, we got back home about 10:30pm and put the kids to bed.  As soon as Antonio and I thought the kids were both asleep, we had to start putting Santa stuff out.  Well, we had decided earlier in the day that Santa was NOT coming to see Tatum because she hadn't been listening for weeks, she wouldn't pick up her room, and she wouldn't even put away her toys after she played with them.  Earlier on Christmas Eve, I had asked Tatum to help me clean her room and she pitched a fit!  She cried, she whined, and she told me she wasn't going to.  So, me being the rational mom who was tired of hearing Tatum tell me she didn't want to clean her room or take care of her toys, decided to use this moment as a teachable moment.  So, I got a big black garbage bag and put all of her toys, books, etc. into the bag.  I thought as soon as she saw me doing this, she would give in and decide to clean her room and help me organize things so we could add new toys that she would get over Christmas.  Well, let me tell you, she didn't care one bit that I was throwing away all of her toys.  She kept telling me she didn't like her toys anyway, she didn't want them anymore, etc.

I must admit, by this point I was really mad...mad at her reaction, and mad because I felt like I was doing something wrong as her mother and the way we are raising her.  I don't want her to be a spoiled brat and not appreciate her things.  After the year we have been through with me losing my job, we have really had to cut back, but we are still so blessed to be able to provide things for the kids (in moderation), yet here she is acting like this. 

I suggested to Antonio that Santa not come because we have been preaching to her that Anderson is telling Santa if she is good or bad and only GOOD kids get visits from Santa.  To my surprise, he agreed with me.

After they were in bed, we wrote a note to Tatum from Santa that explained why Santa didn't leave her anything.  Here it is below.

Santa left her note beside the empty milk cup and cookie crumbs.

Santa did come see Mateo though.  This is what he got from Santa.

We weren't sure how they would react the next morning.  Antonio and I were prepared for Tatum to really break down because Santa left things for Mateo and not for her.  Here is Mateo's reaction...

Antonio read the letter to Tatum and there was no reaction at all on her face.  She did give a little shy smile, but did not breakdown as we had expected her to.

She then told us she didn't care because she had her "RAT" (aka zhu zhu pet) that my friend Amy had given her.  REALLY?!?!  sigh.  Tatum wanted me to take her picture with her RAT (as she calls it) in front of the tree.  Forgive her crazy eyes...this is her new fake smile..lol

After the Santa stuff, we opened presents from each other and Tatum did get stuff from us, so she was fine.

I know Antonio and I probably sound like the meanest parents ever, but I know I felt like if we are preaching and threatening our kids with "Santa won't come see you if you are bad." but never follow through with it, we are doing more harm than good.  We still have her 'Santa gifts' packed up and may give them to her little by little if she earns them by keeping her room clean.  I still have not given her anything out of the black garbage bags from when I packed everything up.  However, our kids got SO MUCH from family at Christmas that I don't know if she has missed any of her old toys.

She did come home last week from school and told us that she had to clean her room without us asking and she went into her room and did just that.  She made her bed and everything, so this may have worked and she may have gotten the message here?  

Christmas 2010 - Part 1

Here are some random pictures from Christmas this year.

This first picture is our Elf, Anderson.  Tatum named him last year and we have no idea where she got the name, but I like it.

We really talked alot with Tatum and Mateo about being good this year because Anderson goes to see Santa every night to tell him if they have been good or bad.  (Remember this because it will come into play in a later blog post.)

I found a christmas tree last year that is for displaying Christmas cards.  I loved using it this year.  It was fun adding to it everyday, but it got full fast!  I need to find another one of these or either find another way to display the rest of our Christmas cards when I run out of room.

One night after church, we headed out to look at Christmas lights.  Tatum was allowed to sit in Daddy's lap when we would stop so she could see them.  Mateo was fine in his seat in the back.

On our way to one house, we passed a church that had a live nativity every night, so we stopped by.  It was very neat and Tatum enjoyed telling us who everyone was and why they were important.  She is growing so fast and is so smart!(yes, of course, i am biased)

The week before Christmas, we went to see Gabby sing in her church musical.  Here are Caiden and Tatum waiting for Gabby's group to sing.

Gabby and Tatum after Gabby got to sing.  She did such a great job!

We decided to take pictures of all 4 of the kids since they were all dressed up in their Christmas outfits.