Now that I’m feeling a little healthier, I thought I’d make up for lost time and try to get some pictures of the kids playing with some of their new toys from Christmas.

When I came into the room BB was playing with her dollhouse – not a new gift. I asked her if she knew where Elmo was, trying to goad her into cooperation using her boyfriend as bait.

She happily grabbed Elmo and was looking gorgeous to boot that day, but she had absolutely no interest in paying attention to mommy or being cooperative.

Luckily this one likes playing along – “You can take my picture, mommy!” (side note: when did he get SO big?)

He did a great job modeling this kaleidoscope for me, which was a lot of fun to photograph.

Then he got BB to play the new xylophone with him. I feel like this picture captures the two of them perfectly – him concentrating studiously, trying to perfect what he’s doing ; her relaxing and making everything she does look effortless.

About this point, I realized that a lot of their Christmas presents were apparently in another room, likely upstairs in their bedrooms. My motivation was waning as they began to lose interest in the whole photo shoot. I looked up at our bookshelf and was all “ah ha!” The kids got a ton of great books for Christmas. So I pulled a bunch down and we read them together and I took some pictures of the kids reading, too.

Some of my favorites that they got this year.

I was about to leave the room when I noticed a few more things to share with you.

Like this.

And this face.

And that one.

Sorry, don’t mind me, I just got lost in their cheekbones and eye lashes and perfect hair and …

Obviously that wasn’t all the presents they got this year, I’ll try to photograph more later. Thank you notes are going to be tough this year as my memory of Christmas Day and who sent  what is now awfully foggy thanks to that bug, but rest assured – the kids and I are very thankful and happy and blessed.