This afternoon, Andrew, Christina along with the kids, came over to open Christmas presents. We have been opening Christmas presents for many, many years on Christmas Eve. Tomorrow, they will let the kids open their gifts from mom and dad at their house.

It is always a little bit of a challenge having everyone in one room opening gifts. However, Kevin is in charge of a contractor-sized garbage bag to dispose of the paper and I hand gifts to the kids in the order I would like to see them opened. The order really doesn’t matter until the get to the last two or three anyway.

I believe this year, since they are older, they opened their gifts faster than ever before. I also wrapped many small items in several large boxes, so they would unwrap one box, but get multiple presents inside. This was helpful not only to me, but also to them.

While the adults unwrapped their gifts, the kids played with some of their new toys. We didn’t allow them to open everything, because we would never get it all together for them to take home. Ashley had bought Amelia a Peppa Pig Campervan, so she played with that while Gavin played with his Little Green Men.

We handed out stockings last. I say stockings, but we actually use gift bags. They are much easier to deal with because they have handles and they can take them home.

Once they opened everything, the kids were ready to leave. This sounds bad, but really, it’s not at all and we take no offense. They know that once they get home, they can open ALL of their toys, so I don’t blame them.

All in all, they were here for about 3 ½ hours. I think they loved everything and had a wonderful Christmas. I can’t wait to visit them to see where they put everything.