The McMillins

We had our first family Christmas together! Corey was scheduled to work but fortunately, his company decided to shut down for Christmas Eve AND Christmas. It was so nice to have him with us.

We had a lot of fun since this was the first year that Zach really "understands" that there is a Santa Claus. We did the usual leaving cookies and milk out for Santa Claus and of course Santa coming Christmas Eve night. We didn't want Zach to focus completely on presents. We want him to realize the most important gift that we were given.... Jesus! We sang "Happy Birthday" to Jesus before we opened gifts and he really seemed to like that. He got kind of bored with the Christmas story but he's a pre-schooler.... that's to be expected.

All of us got spoiled for Christmas. Corey got Gretchen a KitchenAid electric mixer. It's VERY nice. You can add attachments to it. He also got Gretchen a new cell phone. It's a Treo Palm 700P. She got that early! :) Of course, Corey got his xbox 360 that he wanted along with the HD DVD player that goes with it. He got lots of games and movies to use on them. He also got a very nice dress watch that he wanted. Santa brought the family a Sony camcorder that has a 3 MP camera in it. Zach got some video games that he really enjoys (the V.Smile learning system and the Leapster handheld learning system). Santa also brought him some slippers, clothes and games to go with the videos. Plus, he got some videos that he wanted from other people in the family (Poppa Larry and Aunt Brandy, Uncle Russ and Kara).

We didn't really do much after opening gifts. Corey played his xbox 360 the entire day (between 7 & 8 hours). Gretchen kind of expected that so she played with Zach most of the day. She didn't feel 100% that day, so her and Zach took a nap. All in all, it was a nice relaxing day! We are so thankful that God has blessed us with the Christmas that we had. This was all possible because of God. Even if we had nothing, we are just thankful that God gave us his most precious gift.... Jesus. :)