Life with the Walkers: "The best of all gifts around any Christmas tree: the presence of a happy family all wrapped up in each other"-Burton Hillis

Where has December gone? Is Christmas really over? Just a few weeks ago it was Thanksgiving and I was in disbelief over the fact that we only had a few weeks left to get ready for Christmas!

However, we had a fabulous Christmas and we are really enjoying our time off together.

Lucky for us, my parents arrived in town last week and are staying until after the New Year. They are staying with Lauren in Germantown but we have been able to see them quite a bit. I was so thankful that they could watch Nya last Friday while I had to work. It can be challenging taking her with me! She enjoyed herself tremendously. They even watched her Friday night so that I could get the Christmas gifts wrapped! Yay!

Christmas Eve was great. My parents came out to spend the day with us. We watched football and they had the opportunity to experience some spicy jerk chicken from Muffin Man (http://www.muffinmancaribbeancafe.com/). Yum!

In the evening, Nya could not contain her Christmas excitement. We baked some cookies for Santa and made a fun mess!

Not sure how the flour ended up all over her face...

We made snowflakes, Christmas trees, and gingerbread men.

Time for cleanup!

By the end of the night, Nya was exhausted so she went to bed at a good hour and didn't stay up all night. I was worried that she would get up before 5AM, but luckily, she waited until 7:30!

Even Mani was thrilled. She also woke up at 7:30 and even jumped in bed with us! (That's huge for a 13 year old!)

The girls were so excited when we walked into the living room. I think that Nya was more excited about the fact that Santa ate her cookies than the gifts!

Cookies for Santa...

Nya is obsessed with anything having to do with My Little Pony right now. I loved it when I was a kid, too. It's amazing to see how some things have such staying power!

Unwrapping and unwrapping...

Mani really loved the cotton candy maker! Kwesi made some for the girls and it was the real thing! Between her new mini fridge, popcorn popper, and cotton candy maker, Mani said that she is planning to have lots of movie nights with her girls! To be 13 again...

Nya was so anxious for Grandma and PopPop to get up...She said they were "...taking too longer!"

Fun madness

Nya was thrilled to get her popcorn maker too. She kept telling Grandma that she got one like Mani. FYI-moon dough sucks. We will be going back to Play Doh.

The girls finished opening their gifts pretty swiftly. Kwesi and I each received tablets from Santa. I love my Kindle Fire and he loves his HP Touchpad.

(It has been funny to see technology getting so much action this week. This evening, I sat back and looked at Grandma Debra reading on her new Kindle, Nya playing a word game on her MobiGo, Kwesi setting up his tablet, and me reading on my Fire. Even PopPop got a new laptop for Christmas! We were all so content!)

For Christmas dinner, we ventured out to Lauren's place. We were sad to see Mani go home and I think she was too. Nya was overwhelmed with her second Christmas at Aunt Lauren's.