The Noriega Family

Second Christmas morning was fantastic (We did miss having Jodee there though).  The girls were very excited.  I don't remember what time they got up.  We do love teasing them a little before we let them down stairs.  We hooked Hector's phone up the stair rail and recorded the whole thing.  That will be fun later to watch.  

The girls were excited that Santa came and they dove into their stockings.  I love how excited they get about the little things.  They were all pumped about getting tic-tacs...really,, really excited.  Estelle was jazzed to get new underwear and Sienna was excited about new pieces of wood.  They were excited to get their own chocolate oranges this year and some fun candies that they normally do not get.   I love their enthusiasm.  

We had fun with the stocking stuff and then we took a little break for breakfast.  All the girls were excited for sister gifts so we didn't take too long eating our rice pudding and pie.

We had lots of smiles with gifts this year.  There were lots of gifts that more than one kid got and it seems like Sienna always opened hers last so she often knew what it was going to be.  It was okay though, because it was all stuff she was excited about.  Estelle and Sienna got snorkel stuff.  Natalia and Sienna got rain jackets.  They all got neck pillows for the car.  They were them when they watch movies.  It is pretty cute.  

Dad got some Lego sets and we both got snorkel stuff too.  Hector got me some play tickets...that is always a great gift for me!

The other big hit was the rubic's cube.  We got a 2x2 and a 3x3.  Everyone has had fun solving them.  We have all mastered the 2x2!!!

Natalia got a new bike.  We wrapped it and there is just something exciting about a really big gift!

We normally go to Hector's parents when we are done with Christmas morning stuff, but since this was Second Christmas (on Dec. 29th), we found ourselves with a free afternoon.  It was fun to play with the gifts that day.  Everyone did some Lego building.  Sienna got a really cool dragon Lego from Sheng Chi.  And Hector builds his sets with the girls.  They all love doing that.  We played games and ate lots of pie.

In the Evening, we went and watched Sing 2 with Grandma, Krystale, Anthrea and the boys.  It was Krystate's Christmas gift to the kids.  

Estelle sewed Jodee a little heart for me to bring to the hospital.  It was such a bummer that they were not allowing anyone under 16 in the hospital.  

Jodee had her second surgery on the Monday after Christmas, so our plan was to do our Christmas Eve Party on Tuesday the 28th and then Christmas morning on Wednesday the 29th so Jodee could be there.  Unfortunately, they did not let her out of the hospital after her surgery because she had other health complications.  We wanted to wait for Jodee, but Hector had to go back to work on Thursday and he, of course, wanted and needed to be there for Christmas morning.  Jodee was scheduled to fly home on Thursday, so this ended up being the last day we could postpone.  We were sad that Jodee still had to miss it; it would have been more fun with her.  

We did some cooking in the morning and then I spent the afternoon with Jodee at the hospital.  When I got back, we did our Christmas Eve Dinner.  Sienna made the rainbow Jell-O this year!  Natalia made shrimp scampi and we had crab cakes and cheddar corn and a fancy drink.  But the girls were most excited about the games.  

We started with the guessing gifts.  We were all super full from dinner, so we decided to go for a walk and take some of the gifts with us.  The girls and Hector asked questions while we walked and if they guessed correctly, they opened it and I handed them a new gift from one of my many coat pockets.  It was a fun way to get the game started and it may be a new tradition for us.  

We finished the guessing gifts when we got back home.  Sienna has decided that she is not very good at this game.  Estelle got all the best gifts this year.  It is random, but it seems that every year one person makes out way better than everyone else.  

Then we moved on to the cellophane ball.  This is everyone's favorite.  We recorded the whole thing this year.  I also added a new element this year.  We called them freeze cards.  If you got to a card in the ball, you had to stop and do whatever the card said.  Some were silly, like sing karaoke to your favorite Christmas song, or say, "Ho Ho Ho, Merry Christmas" in a Santa voice.  Some were simple like switch directions and some were good like swap a gift with someone or steal a present.  Pop Rocks and Ring Pops were the coveted gifts that came from the ball.  Sienna was so excited to have Pop Rocks and then Estelle got the swap a gift freeze card.  She traded a penny for Sienna's Pop Rocks.  It was pretty funny.  Sienna was devastated and but ended up getting a $5.00 bill from the ball.  She didn't realize she could get lots of Pop Rocks for $5.00.  

After our games we watched a movie and then set our stockings for Santa and went to bed.  It was a great little evening.  Hector and I stayed up a bit longer after the girls went to bed, but we were all excited for Second Christmas Morning to come.  

Natalia got her Covid shot before Christmas and Sienna and Estelle got theirs right after.  They were all a bit worried, but realized it was not big deal at all.  They really could not even feel it.  Strange times we live in though.  Who would have thought we would still be dealing with Covid almost two years after it all started.  I know I did not.  And I am so ready to move on from all of this.  

Christmas Day and Grandma and Grandpa's house is always fantastic!  We love spending the day with family.  We had summer weather on Christmas this year. I think it got up to 70 degrees.  

We had great food and lots of fun and yummy treats (a day I WAS eating sugar). The kids opened stockings from Grandma and we all had fun watching everyone open gifts.  The girls were really excited about their camelpacks and new pajamas.  Sienna loved her cup stacking!  Luke and Eli have cup stacking too and all the kids (plus some of the adults) had fun trying to stack in the fastest times.  Since the weather was so nice the kids went to the park and played gaga ball before the sun set and snuck in a surprise visit to Jodee.  I didn't think I would make it on Christmas with the limited visiting hours and our family plans, so it was nice that I was able to make both work.  I was a really nice day.  We played games and watched movies the next day and just enjoyed our Christmas fun.