christmas morn... surprises a-plenty

i love christmas morning. isn't it the best? well this christmas, i had been carefully crafting a surprise for cade so i was even MORE excited for santa's visit.... if that is even possible. cade and i woke up and vi was still snoozing so we decided to exchange our gifts before the little cherub woke up.

cade went first. he had a surprise of his own that he had been carefully crafting as well. he had wrapped up a big, heavy box... which really made me wonder what he had thought of. i opened the box to find a whole lotta oranges and a simple piece of paper telling me that my real present was on the printer. i raced to the computer and found my ticket- yes, my PLANE TICKET to DC to go see my best friend, laney, and hang out with all the girls out east. i couldn't have been more thrilled. i have been wanting to visit her for a really long time so this meant so much. i have already taken the trip (the tickets were for a flight a few weeks after christmas), so i include a teaser picture to get ready for the DC post in its entirety.

i was already on a high and there was still more gift giving to go. for weeks i had been working on a secret project that cade knew nothing about. one night he found out i was working on a project but i made him promise not to look in the back yard where i was "storing his gift" and ruin the surprise. he kept his word, but the man had no idea the real surprise was right under his feet. remember this contest? cade was a finalist to win money for his man cave. we lost... so, for christmas, i called in all my favors with my siblings and together we managed to completely re-do cade's man cave. it wasn't a 15000 dollar renovation by any means, but it was enough to get the cave to cade's liking.
here is a before shot:

and here are some after shots:


cade had no idea that the week before christmas, i would wait for him to leave for work and then i would quickly drop down into his crawl-space-cave and work like crazy all day. i learned so much about building and remodeling. we put up drywall, mudded, sanded, painted, installed a projector into the ceiling, rewired, decorated, built shelves... the whole bit. the part i loved most about all of this was that cade had NO IDEA it was happening. so, on christmas morning, i told him his gift was not in the backyard anymore but i had actually moved it to the crawl space. i let him go first and i listened as he shouted his surprises. he loved it... he loved it so much, he even had tears in his eyes by the time i had lowered myself down! since christmas, cade and i have been putting in the final touches down there and it is finally the room he wanted- complete with tv projecting on the wall. a true man cave.

both surprises were fantastic and it led to a special christmas morning.

by this point, the vi pie had finally started to stir so we brought her out and let her open her gifts as well. she was more interested in the paper and the boxes, but it was fun to have this first experience.


after christmas morning at our house, we went to grammy's house for breakfast. violet loves eating grammy's food. she kicks back, puts a leg up and eats herself silly.

basically, we all did the same thing.

after the meal, we opened presents from the gift exchange. vi got a push car from grammy and she LOVED the box. she kept climbing on top and screaming with joy. it was her very favorite thing. when she finally understood what was inside the box, she loved that too.

we spent the day playing with all our toys, visiting with family and having a special christmas program at nana and gramps' house later on.
it was a great christmas and we love how blessed we are with family and friends who love and support us.