"OH. MY. GOSH!!!"

That's exactly what we heard in our house over and over and over again on Christmas morning. Well, that and "I just can't believe it!" Yep, that's all we heard while Isabella was busy opening all of her and Sam's presents. And let me tell ya guys, it was absolutely magical.

Although Sam is obviously oblivious, Isabella is finally old enough to get the concept of Jesus' birth and Santa and presents. One of the first things she said when we went to get her in the morning was "Happy Birthday, Jesus!", immediately followed by "Did Santa leave presents?"

There was no shortage of surprise and excitement as one by one she opened presents she has been hoping for since October; a Dora bike and a Dora helmet, a camera and the most coveted Moon Sand all brought to her by Santa. Mommy and Daddy had a few other presents for her but the big surprise from us was a Dora scooter which was a HUGE hit. In addition, amongst many of the presents she received from family and friends , she was especially excited about the LeapFrog Tag Reading System that Grandma and Grandpa sent, since she is desperate to learn to read, and the Polly Pockets toys that Tata & Papa Abu sent from Florida. According to her: "This was the best Christmas EVER!"

As you can imagine, Sam was more entertained by the wrapping paper mess around him than he was by all the toys. However, there was one toy in particular that captivated him for quite a while; the Playschool Busy Gears. They are colorful and they move and make noise. I tell ya, that Santa was onto something when he left this particular toy. We're slowly but surely setting up Sam's toys so that he's not totally overwhelmed. So far, so good!

Yeah, this is pretty much what Sam looked like during the present opening portion of the day. It's almost as if he's pondering whether or not he can take this big box on.


Lucky for us we got to hang around the house in our PJs and play with our new toys for most of the day before heading out to Uncle Chris' house for dinner and our gifts exchange. Sam took a pretty good morning nap, but skipped his afternoon nap altogether. Bad Idea! Undoubtedly this is what you get when Sam skips his afternoon nap:

Yeah, I wish I could you that's a special rendition of Jingle Bells he's belting out there with his cousins, but unfortunately that's not the case. He was this cranky for most of our visit. It was the BEST!

Isabella got to play with her new bike today for the first time and that went a little something like this:

I'm ready to roll people! I'm sitting on my bike and I've got my helmet and my knee pads on.
You know what they say: Safety First!
Hmm, why aren't I going anywhere?

WHAT?!?! What do you mean I have to pedal? Are you kidding me? Seriously, you're expecting me to do all the work? Why isn't this motorized? Isn't this supposed to be like a toy or something? Fine, then someone just push me while I "look" like I'm biking. What, no takers?

Then forget this,...

I'm moving on to my scooter. At least then one foot rests while the other one works and they can take turns. I'm so outta here. See ya!

Quick, tell me, what's the first word that comes to mind!!! Just curious, is it something along the line of DIVA?!?!