Two Little Schmidts

I think Santa may have been too busy making toys this year to watch and see how my kids were behaving. I think if the big guy had been paying attention, there would have been a little less presents and a lot more coal. Maybe he got things a little bit backwards decided to give them a present for every time Cameron traumatized Dillon by farting in his bed, for every time that Dillon squealed his high pitched little scream-squeal noise? I'm not sure how things worked, but the boys got a lot of really amazing gifts and they pretty much had perma-grins on their faces for hours.

We spent Christmas Eve in our normal tradition at my Grandma, Oma's house. Everyone in the family was there, except my severely allergic to cats husband who stayed home to avoid being miserable from Oma's cat Luna, and to be Santa's Elf and build Dillon's Christmas present in the backyard. We dined on ham and potato salad with fresh rolls straight from the bakery. Surrounded by close family, we sat and talked and then moved on to the main event... Presents!!

Cameron got tons of Lego sets that he had been oogling from the Lego Magazine for months, as well as a really cool Kodak digital camera that he has taken many really amazing pictures and a few funny videos of Dillon so far. Dillon and my niece Denali got a Step2 Play Kitchen with pots, pans, dishes, and some play food. They played on that for a really long time!! I could totally see them all grown up and cooking for their families. Dillon got a dinosaur that walks around that he makes chase our dog, Jack, a membership to his most favorite place on earth, the Children's Discovery Museum, a Zippity learning system to get some of his crazy energy out, a Tinkerbell book. (He thinks she's cute and beautiful btw...), and a whole construction worker set complete with a jackhammer, helmet and tools. We had a wonderful, pretty peaceful time on Christmas Eve.

Here's our family group shot taken by Cameron's new camera!

Flash forward to Christmas morning. Karl and I are laying in bed, awake for some reason. We looked at the clock and saw it was 7 am and thought it was amazing that no little boys were up yet. All of a sudden we hear Dillon get up, close the door to his room, make a pit stop in the bathroom, walk through our room and past us in bed, into the living room, PAST the Christmas tree, and go into the kitchen to play on the computer! I called out to him "Hey Dillon, did Santa come?" "I don't know" he said. "Well, why don't you go check?" So he slowly got up, went into the living room and said "He did come!" He ran and woke up Cam and it was time to start our morning.

Cameron got tons of stuff. Diary of a Wimpy Kid books that he just loves, Pictureka!, the movie G-Force, clothes, an Air Hockey game, a 2 player paintball gun game, a real paintball gun from Daddy, and a ton of other really cool toys and games. The boys also got the new Wii Sports Resort game from Grandma Julie, and have been taking turns playing fencing and archery. What a neat game! Here's Cam just moments after opening his new Laptop from Santa... He was in shock!!

Now don't feel too sorry for Mr. Dillon quite yet. He got the movie Aliens in the Attic, the much desired Pogo Stick, some clothes that he looks pretty cute in, and some more magnetic letters for his Leapfrog learning system that goes on the fridge. He spelled "kid" yesterday, I was pretty impressed! Here's Dillon happily bouncing away on his new trampoline Christmas morning. Oh yea, Cameron took this pic!

Looking back on past Christmas Days, I think this is one of our best yet. It was so relaxed and the kids were very appreciative and polite to everyone. I was really proud. We were surrounded by family who loved us. What more could you possibly ask for?