On the forty-seventh day of Christmas...

Okay, so it didn't feel like the forty-seventh day, but I felt like I've written about that many posts so far. :-P

We got home way too late on Christmas Eve to open our last presents, so on Christmas morning, we...


celebrated Advent (the Christmas Day readings from our K Family Advent Service),





raided our stockings,

had breakfast from them (sorry, no pictures, but everyone picks a cereal box or breakfast bar [no Pop Tarts to be found this year :-(], and we scramble eggs),

and then opened presents.

From our name-drawing on ML's side of the family, we got...


an Aquadoodle mat from Cousin Liselle,


a new Hermie DVD and a Webkinz ballet costume from Cousin Noelle,


a Webkinz monkey figurine and two very cool Wall-E t-shirts from Cousin Luke,


and a Webkinz camo outfit and extremely cool book, Art Fraud Detective from Cousin Charis (in spite of the fact that he looks rather non-plussed in the picture, he took his fully camo-decked-out koala and his book with us to our big Christmas party :-).

ML got two very nice shirts from his brother-in-law, Aaron, and I got an awesome knitting book (Mason-Dixon Knitting, supposed to be very funny and helpful/practical) and a great DVD (Ever After) from ML's sister, Mindy.

Thank you so much, everyone!

After present opening, we did some mad wrapping and last-minute preparations for our big Christmas celebration with our ex-pat friends here (fortunately, I'd already cooked my main contributions, refried beans and el charro beans, ahead of time in the crockpot). We had such a wonderful time eating Mexican food, opening presents, swapping white elephant gifts and playing Worst Case Scenario that we forgot to take any pictures. I'm going to try to round some up so that I can post them. That and a picture of the largest Christmas tree in-country that we visited on Christmas Eve. Our camera was out of battery, so we're going to need to get that from a friend.

So, I haven't completely blogged Christmas, but I think I get some prize for number of posts today, don't you? Maybe I can finish tomorrow. Right now, though, I've got to exercise, shower and get the kids ready to head to our friends' house for a Numb3rs watching session. ML will join us after his guest leaves.

Merry Christmas to all! And to all a good night! (Or afternoon! Or whatever time of the day it is when you read this!)