A visit from St. Nicholas

Dining room table set with our pretty Christmas table cloth and dishes, and little monogrammed stockings filled with real gold dollars (!!!), chocolate coins, and candy canes.  We also had clementines, hot candy cane cocoa, and
Butter Braid pastries that I specifically ordered from the kids' school fundraiser for this morning's breakfast.  :)

Our St. Nicholas statue, and a new wooden sign I bought at Hobby Lobby.  Love it! 
Also:  St. Nicholas DVD and (not pictured) some appropriate Christmas books.

Austin held up his candy canes and said, "Look, Mommy!  A heart!"  ♥

The kids were so happy to wake up this morning and find all their goodies.  Over breakfast, Dylan sighed and said, "I wish we didn't have to go to school."  With one look at each other, Darren and I made the unspoken executive decision to let them stay home.  We wrote notes to their teachers that we were keeping them home today for personal family reasons, which is true!  I'm so happy to share this special day with them.  We're listening to the David Archuleta Holiday Pandora station right now while deep cleaning their bedroom.  I've promised that if we can get it done today I'll take them after school tomorrow to buy a Christmas tree of their very own to set up in the big bay window of their shared room.  They don't realize it, but failure is not an option here!  Even if I have to do most of it myself, their room WILL be clean by tonight, because I am in love with the thought of Darren reading them their nightly bedtime Christmas story by the glow of Christmas tree lights.  Happy St. Nicholas Day!