One of a kind Christmas

This year we had a wonderful Christmas - different from any that we've had before. For various reasons we had made the decision to stay in NC for the holidays. Out of four sets of parents, none were able to make the trip this year to see us either. So we were expecting a quiet day. Christmas Eve we went to our 5:30 service at church where I played and sang for a portion of the service. Since we had no other plans we looked for a restaurant to eat at. Many suggestions had been given to find a Chinese place but instead we ate at one of our favorite places, Chili's. We went home and read the Christmas story to the kids which has become a Christmas Eve tradition for our family.
The girls were very excited and Christmas day began at 7 a.m. The girls love to watch each other open their presents, so we took our time with each gift. When the packages began to dwindle down I could sense a bit of disappointment in my eldest's eyes. She even mumble to no one in particular, that she wasn't getting the American girl she wanted. But then I reminded her that there were still some presents tucked behind the tree. Anna received the American Girl, Julie and Emily received, Kit. These they had been asking for, for several months and were overjoyed! The other prized possession was wrapped and placed in the tree - the High School Musical 3 soundtrack. Fortunately they have their own CD player in their room or John and I may have gone crazy by now listening to it.
One set of friends began calling us by mid morning, when are you coming over, they asked. We really had not planned on leaving the apartment for the day, so we were trying to decide what to do. The day before I had prepared some items for us to cook for our family on Christmas. We had even bought a turkey to cook on the grill. We decided to just take the food with us and carried it down to their house. So we spent the rest of the day with friends, eating and relaxing. The kids played with their new things. Later that evening another family came over as well and we played some new games. The children began to tire and we decided it was time to go.
Once we had gotten in the car, we realized that some of our kids were a bit hungry since they had been more busy playing and less busy eating. So where else was there to stop on Christmas Day - Waffle House!
Our family plus one other went to Waffle House for dinner, that was four adults and eight children. Can you imagine trying to find tables enough to seat us? Well, John and I laughed as we reminisced over our day. It was definitely a Christmas to remember. After a few waffles and hash brown eaten we drove to a nearby neighborhood with Christmas lights. One street in particular had syncronated lights set to music which you could tune into on the radio. It was really amazing and the perfect way to end our day, the first Christmas in NC!