Twas the night before Christmas and all through our house EVERY creature was stirring, even the mouse.  The stockings were hung by the chimney with care and children ran wild all through the air. 

That’s how our night before Christmas went.  We did manage to keep the kids busy all morning cleaning the house for Santa’s arrival.   Always a good thing.  They clean better and work harder than any day of the year!  Seriously, you should ALL have your children clean the house for Santa.  It works wonders! 

Then it was time to wrap presents.  With a toddler around it was just easier to leave the wrapping until the very last minute so as to avoid rewrapping and ruined surprises thanks to curious little fingers.
I should have have seen it coming.  But I didn’t.  I never do see these train wrecks before they are upon me.   I took all three boys into our little office wrapping headquarters to wrap their gifts for Dad and siblings.  The floor was scattered with ribbons and bows, wrapping paper and boxes.  Not to mention scissors.  As soon as I shut the door they literally started bouncing off the walls.  It was like I’d just let them loose in a bouncer house.  All of their pent up Christmas energy just exploded in that little room.  If you had been listening outside the door this is what you would have heard.
”Stop fighting with those tubes!  They are NOT swords until the wrapping paper is gone!”  “Levi, don’t’ touch the scissors.”  “But I want to put on the bows!” tears, fits, etc.  “Cade, hand me the tape.”  “Cade, Hand Me the Tape!”  “CADE! HAND ME THE TAPE!” “Levi, don’t touch the scissors!” “No.  We are NOT changing the gift now-it’s Christmas Eve!!!  I don’t care if you changed your mind!” “Mom, Cade already gave me a clue about my present and I know what it is.”  (note: this happens every year. Cade canNOT keep a secret to save his life.) “Cade, next year you get to find out what you’re giving your brothers when they open it under the tree and NOT BEFORE!” 
At one point while I sat on the floor trying to help the older two wrap their presents, Levi ran around and around us with the red ribbon streaming out behind him as he jumped over scissors and dodged paper tubes.  I was so busy refereeing the wrapping between the other two that I didn’t notice till we were surrounded in several layers of ribbon.  Levi got to leave the room at that point and was only invited in to be the designated bow sticker and present-to-tree deliverer.  Next year maybe we’ll give gift cards instead.

Later we did our traditional nativity play.  Cade finally decided he no longer wanted to be a lowly shepherd and informed Reagan that he was ousting him out of the all important angel role.  His exact words to Reagan were, “I just don’t want to feel afraid anymore.” (referring to the shepherd’s fear of the angel) That didn’t go over too well as you can imagine.  They finally decided to split the deal and Reagan did the Mary/Joseph angel and Cade did the Shepherds angel.  Levi still wanted to be the camel.  Here for your watching enjoyment I give you the camel video from last year to refresh your memories of his talent in the role.