Luckily, Dr. Fauci went to the North Pole himself to vaccinate Santa. So, Christmas went off without a hitch! Both sets of Grandparents joined us over Zoom to watch the kids open their gifts. And I tricked them all this year–no one correctly guessed their wrapping paper. Santa brought Blake a Sonic Watch. Josh got a magnetic globe with pins to mark off all the places he’s been. Halle got lots of beauty supplies–curling iron, new makeup brushes and a monthly subscription to Ispy, which sends her fun beauty goodies in a cute makeup bag each month.

Santa wrote a pretty great letter to the kids this year and brought a fun ornament to help them remember. It’s been a very different year, but that’s not all bad. We’ve learned new things and grown in unexpected ways. I hope we all remember that and don’t just automatically classify 2020 as a bad year.

The dearest wish of Blake’s heart was to get some hover shoes. They were pretty expensive, so grandma and grandpa Banks chipped in and Blake contributed his Dec allowance. Still, he wasn’t sure. We had lots of discussions about it the week before Christmas. Each day it didn’t appear under the tree he thought his chances were diminishing. I didn’t put them under the tree until he’d gone to bed Christmas Eve night. I wanted it to be a total surprise. And it was! He was so happy. In the video below I think he looks like the Grinch slithering around gathering up all the presents from the Whos.

Other Favorites included $10 from Uncle Cole, Google Merch from dad and new tennis shoes for Josh. Grandma and Grandpa Cornell got them 6 month subscriptions to Kiwi Crate. Hopefully this will help pass the long winter hours. Oh–and as I’m sure you noticed, Halle’s big present this year was purple hair! She loves it. We went and got it done just a few days before Christmas.

But perhaps the greatest gift of the season was from Rusty to me. Hope Never Dies. An Obama/Biden mystery novel. I haven’t laughed that hard in a long time.

Santa’s sneaky elves were at it again. This year the kids’ stockings were locked up tight in this box. They had to solve a series of riddles in order to find the key (hidden in the mailbox) and rescue their stockings. It was so fun.

The hit item in the stockings was Rock em Socks. Halle’s socks have Dash’s face all over them, and the boys got socks from “Among Us,” Everyone’s favorite quarantine game.

Here’s “Christmas Blake.” He’s got his hat from Dad, mask and socks from his stocking, his new clothes and his hover shoes.

Rusty and I went for our traditional Christmas walk. It was pretty much the opposite of a White Christmas walk. It was like 55 degrees. I didn’t hate it. We got a spot to go ice skating in Louisville, and after a rocky start, we had a great time. Except for when Josh fell and I was really worried he’d broken his elbow. It swelled up so quickly! Luckily after a bit it started feeling better. But he was pale and shaky for awhile. Dad pulling everyone in sleds, and races with mom were so fun.

Everyone still agrees that this is our Best Christmas Present Ever:

We ended the evening playing our new game, What Do you Meme, and watching Soul–the latest Pixar movie that released right to Disney+. Merry Christmas everyone!