Christmas

This was a wonderful Christmas because we had 3 grandparents to celebrate with us. This is the first time we celebrated Christmas with Michael. I was disappointed when I found out that two of my children had discovered their "big" Christmas gift. We usually limit our Christmas budget to $125 for each child because I feel that is a sufficient amount to give nice gifts but not enough to spoil or try to keep up with the other families. This year I went over that amount to buy the big kids new Kindles. I justified it with the fact that they recently dropped in price and were much more affordable than past years. Plus, my kids love to read and I am tired of Erin carrying huge novels in her backpack to school. Her teachers allow the kids to bring in Kindles for reading. Unfortunately when Erin was looking them up on Amazon.com, it told her that I had recently purchased 2 of those items. Eric let it slip on Christmas Eve. Nathan asked for one gift and that was a Lego Agents helicopter that goes with his big Agents truck from last Christmas. He spotted the box under the tree that he knew was his helicopter. So 3 of my kids knew their gifts. What a disappointment! I will have to be much more sneaky next year.

Eric and Erin LOVE their kindles. Unfortunately I didn't realize that they have lots of games of them too, so they use them for gaming as much as reading. At least most of the free games are word games...slightly educational. Nathan loved his new helicopter and Zach liked his new Lego Police Station. It even had little toilets in the jail cells. How cute is that!

This year I assigned the kids a sibling to buy for and gave them each $50. Erin bought Nathan a Lego Robot to go with his Agent set.

Eric bought Zachary a new Arizona Cardinals comforter and sheet set.

Nathan bought Erin a stuffed animal horse, a puzzle, and the Lego game Creationary.

Zach bought Eric the new Wii Donkey Kong Country game with the guide and t-shirt.

They each bought their other siblings small presents with their own money. I gave Mario a copy of my blog that I had printed into a book, a book filled with pictures from all our vacations since we were married, and the Axis and Allies game.

Mario gave me a Pedicure gift certificate, some small bowls, a medium Pampered chef bar pan, and the Pampered Chef covered baker. The consultant (Zach is good friends with her son) was very generous and gave him everything 50% off. I guess she let him use some extra host points that she had that were going to expire.