Emma's Editorials: Christmas at Mimi's Part 4

After sneaking some of the humans' traditional Christmas breakfast (scrambled eggs, biscuits, and sausage gravy), we hurried back to the room to open our gifts.  We were all so excited!

Jo really liked her Razzles lunch box that we got her.  

Charlie loved her cute stuffed monkey from Mama.

Isn't he adorable?

My first gift was from Mama, Hayden, Charlie, Ruthie and Piper.  Mama had warned me ahead of time that I wouldn't be getting my special edition Cecile doll.  They were sold out before she had a chance to get one.  I was disappointed when she told me, but I knew life would go on whether I got my Cecile or not. 

You can imagine how excited I was when I opened up this beautiful Holiday Edition Belle doll!

It wasn't a Cecile, but it was probably the next best thing.  She was so beautiful!

Isn't her dress amazing?  I just love her!

Hayden got to go next.  She was really excited to see the toy horses that Charlie and I had gotten for her.

Hayden is a total horse nut, so we knew she'd love these.

Her favorites were the mommy and baby Palominos.  She told us that Palominos and Friesians were her favorite types of horses.  We didn't even know! :)

Ruthie's first gift was from Hayden, Charlie, Grandmama and I.  We hoped she'd like it, and she did!

It was her very own Kirsten doll (minus the shoes...she was a thrift store find). ;)

Ruthie didn't have her own American Girl doll before this, so she was really happy to get a Kirsten.

My sweet cousin.

Even quiet Piper let out a gasp of delight when she opened her gift.

Charlie, Hayden and I saw this Chococat notebook at Target and knew it was perfect for our cousin. 

Kailani was next.  Her gift was from everyone (we all pitched in).  It was a very dolly Christmas, because she got her first doll too!

Kailani thought Samantha was just beautiful.

Then it was Janie's turn, and she got a doll too!  It was a Julie from Grandmama.  We all oohed and ahhed over her long, silky hair.

Janie and Julie (isn't Janie's hat adorable on her?)

There were lots of other presents:

Hayden got these beautiful charms of all three of her favorite princesses (Ariel, Jasmine, and Belle) from Ruthie and Piper...

...and a Disney Princess puzzle from Grandmama. 

Tess had sent this present with me.  It was a beautiful blank journal MADE IN INDIA!!! 

I couldn't wait to fill it with sketches and notes. :)

I also got a Wooly Willy from Grandmama.  I think I'll use him to entertain myself on long car rides. :)

Charlie was really happy to get this Ken doll from Toy Story 3 (her favorite Pixar movie).  Ruthie and Piper had found it for her.

She also got Cars Squinkies from Hailey (which was funny, because she'd gotten Hello Kitty Squinkies for Hailey.  Neither of them knew they'd gotten each other the same thing!).

Jo got an Uno game from Grandmama...

...and a vintage Holly Hobbie doll from Piper.

Ruthie gave Janie a Connect 4 game.

Kailani got a card game from Grandmama (that looked very Hawaiian!)...

...and two Cars Squinkies from Piper.

Grandmama got Piper a Wooly Willy game too...

...but Piper's favorite present from Grandmama was this cute mini rolling stamp that had Chococat on it!

She also got this Chococat eraser set from Ruthie.  It was a very Chococat Christmas for Piper! ;)

Grandmama found this little Hello Kitty case for Ruthie.  I think Hailey has the same one at home.

Zaara's gift was this lovely jingly necklace.  Grandmama wanted to make sure Zaara didn't feel left out in all of our festivities, even though she's basically a "display-only" doll. :)  

I think her new necklace suits her perfectly!

Here we are with all of our goodies!

When we were done opening everything, all of us on the front part of the dresser turned around so we could see what the others got.

All in all, we had a great Christmas.  We spent the rest of the day reading the Christmas story from Mama's Bible, playing with our new things, and watching movies.  Some of us even took naps since we'd stayed up really late the night before.  

We didn't really get any more pictures of anything else.  I'll tell you guys about coming home in a later post.  I've done plenty of posting for tonight, and my shoulders are tired from listening to Bollywood music for an hour! (You can't help but make your shoulders dance when you listen to it!) ;)

Thanks for bearing with me and reading through my really long posts.  I promise next time I'll try to have something more creative and astounding for you to read. ;) 

Emma's Editorials: Christmas at Mimi's Part 3

After hours of waiting, Christmas Eve arrived.  We thought it would be fun to have a sleepover on the living room floor, so we dragged our sleeping bags and pillows out there, got dressed in our jammies, and raided the snack table! ;)

Charlie and Kailani chatted with Hayden.  They were trying to guess what everyone's presents were.

Hayden was savoring her M&Ms.  You know, chocolate is always better when it's NOT in doll scale! ;)  Oh, and a random Hayden trivia fact here:  blue M&Ms are her favorite. :)

I was busy enjoying another one of Mama's aunts yummy gingerbread cookies and visiting with Ruthie, Piper, and Janie.  

We were trying to figure out the best time to wake up in the morning.  

Ruthie and Piper thought 5:30 would be perfect...

...but Janie suggested sleeping in a little bit and going for 6:30.   In the end (after a lot of discussion), we struck a compromise and decided on 6:00.

We talked and talked until we couldn't keep our eyes open.

Then, one by one, we all nodded off and curled up in our sleeping bags.

It was so peaceful sleeping out there underneath the tree!  Maybe that will be a new yearly tradition for us. :D

Hayden and Charlie were the ones that woke up right at 6:00 (actually, to be perfectly honest, they woke up at around 5:00!) and woke us all up right on time.

We headed back to Mimi's doll room, where the tree, our stockings, and our presents were waiting.  Jo hadn't been able to join us for the slumber party, as she'd been busy in the kitchen, but she joined us for stockings and presents. 

Mama woke up in time to join us and made us all take a group picture before we opened anything.  You know how Mama is about documenting everything! ;)

Even Zaara got a stocking!  It matched her outfit perfectly. :)

Once the pictures had been taken, we all got to open up our stockings.

Grandmama had gotten all of us these shiny recorders.  They were the perfect size for us, and they really worked! :)

Everyone also got 2 milk chocolate Hershey's kisses and 1 mint truffle kiss.  The mint ones were pretty amazing!

Each of us also got a little mini container of bubbles.  Hayden was really excited to get her favorite color.

We all loved our stockings.  Most of ate our chocolate right away.  Ah, chocolate:  the breakfast of champions. ;)

Wow, I have a lot of pictures from opening our presents, so I think I'll save that for another post.  Otherwise, you'll all be incredibly bored reading through a huge post! ;)