Girls and their gifts

The girls got to open their Christmas gifts on the 28th when we got back to a rainy and flooding St Louis. I was exhausted, and thought we might wait for the next morning, but they were just so excited. 

It was a fun way to end a long day of travel. 

Papa and Grams sent $ for the girls. Kara chose to use hers in Mexico. She got a set of drums because making music reminds her of Papa. I apparently don't have a photo of them. 
Evie and Kiersten preferred to have me use their money for a gift they could open and be surprised. Evie got a rock star kit and car for her Journey girl doll. The guitar actually works surprisingly well.

Kiersten got some chubby puppies. She loves those things! She also got one from Aunt Katie, so she's had a lot of fun with them.

Kiersten was very excited to give Evie this sweater. 

Kara gave both of her sisters tsum tsums, and received on from Kiersten. It's surprising to me how much they love these. 

They have just been dying to know what's in their big gift from us. 

We gave Evie a horse for her journey girl doll. We also got her the horse barn for it. She was not expecting this, and was over-joyed. She named her horse "Thunder".

Kiersten has been a little concerned that her gift was not physically large. I keep reminding her that sometimes exciting things come in a smaller box. I love the look on Kara's face off to the side. She was a slight bit jealous.

We got her Disney Infinity 2 and 3 for Wii U. All of the girls have spent hours playing it already. They both came with some characters, and we also bought several extra characters for them. I think the 2 little girls each got 4 more, and Kara got 3, since her gift cost a bit more. 

Kara had a pretty big box to open. She has been guessing for weeks on what it was. She was convinced that it was a ping pong table. Last year she actually guessed her gift from us, and I said she was wrong. So this year, she told me, "mom, it's okay if you say it isn't a ping pong table. I know that's what it is". She was wrong. It was a basketball hoop. I was nervous that we got all of them gifts they hadn't asked for, but we knew they would love them. They were all very happy and excited with their gifts from us. 

We only gave them a few gifts this year because of the cruise. I liked that they had fewer things to fit into their lives, so I might keep to that again next year. They still had lots of gifts to open from family and friends to keep things exciting!

Kiersten had such a happy day. She wasn't sure which things she wanted to open first. 

Evie has had a pretty fun couple of weeks with her cool gifts. She was eager for me to clear space in her room for the horse barn.

While I made dinner, they had a great time with Kiersten's chubby puppies. It was great to be home and hear their happy squeals and laughter from the other room.