Presents at last!

We waited to open up presents until we had figured out the camera, so we could take lots of pictures for the blog. Fortunately we don't have children, because it was late afternoon before we could open the gifts. This is the camera box, memory card, and carrying case. We appreciate Robyn's recommendations on cameras. We are very pleased so far with our camera.


We didn't even wrap the camera, because we knew what it was and we wanted to use it immediately. The first picture we took was an unofficial family portrait. We don't have a stand, so I am holding it up. It turned out pretty good!


The first present we opened was the egg. Marilyn was so excited that Ryan had been sneaky enough to put presents in it just a few days after we put the tree up. Good thing he didn't tell her they were there until a few days before Christmas or she'd have been very tempted to peek. There were earrings and a necklace. Ryan loves for Marilyn to wear rubies, real or in this case synthetic.



Some of these boxes have been sitting in wrapping paper in our tiny storage closet for a whole year waiting for this Christmas morning. Last year we were able to drive, and Mom Smith was prepared with all our presents for this year's Christmas. I don't know how she gets things done so early. You can watch us open the chargers in video below. There were three boxes, for a lovely set of 12 that will match our Royal Albert china. Here are the other presents:




These are definitely the best set of brushes I have ever owned. I almost don't want to get them dirty with makeup and hairstyling!


Mom Reid's package was in the mail for a long time. We anxiously waited and hoped it would arrive on time, and it did get here Saturday afternoon. Here's the card with our gift receipts taped to the back. We won't be needing them, because we love our gifts.




And do they fit? Perfectly!



Last year Marilyn and Kelly went to this concert with the whole family. It was the best Christmas concert Marilyn has ever seen. She really enjoyed it and has been waiting all year to show this to Ryan.


"The Little Red Buckets... what can I say? I cried when I opened this present. Mom reads this story to us every year. It's one of our Reid family favorites. The red folder is full of copies of our traditional Christmas stories. Next year Mom and I will be designing a binder in which to place these treasures." (Marilyn)


We will be receiving one of our Christmas presents sometime in August this year. Marilyn's brother Marcus phoned us to say that he wants to design and build us a custom piece of small furniture. He's an excellent woodworker, and we are thrilled to see what he works up.

The nightmare before Christmas

Marilyn's brother Richard sent us this awesome Christmas card! We laughed so hard. I promised Richard to include it since nobody but Mom got to see it before it was sent to us. Enjoy!

Our new camera rocks!

This was the first thing we filmed with our new camera. We had spent a while waiting to open our presents while we figured out how to video record some of it on the camera, so Marilyn was very impatient when we finally filmed. We also didn't realize that video does not rotate the same way that still pictures do. The video of Ryan opening presents was therefore entirely on the side...oh, well. Bear with us as we learn the ropes of blogging. Merry Christmas!


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I couldn't resist filming Ryan reading part of this story. It's Horace and Morris Join the Chorus (but what about Dolores?). Mom Reid found it in a Cheerios box and sent it because she knew we'd love it. Ryan likes to read stories and I really give him so little chance to practice. This is the end of the story. We would have done the whole book, but that would be too long to blog... at least for now.


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Thank you to my friend Sarah for showing me how to add video clips on the blog. Her blog is one of my favorite things. It is an awesome inspiration. Check it out at http://abirrdslife.blogspot.com/.

Other Christmas Decorations

This is our front window. You can see our colored lights Ryan hung and the pretty candles burning.

Dave's market down the street always has such beautiful flowers available, and Ryan frequently picks up a little something to surprise Marilyn. These are the Christmas roses. They opened so beautifully!

Each of these candles was a Christmas gift in years past. They have all been such a joy to us, especially at this season. Sadly, they are all ready to retire after this year's festivities.

Marilyn's Christmas pillow. Mom Reid made these for all the children many years ago. Each child has a unique pillow. Marilyn wants to learn to sew like her mother does.

This is our festive welcome "wreath." It was perfect for many reasons. First, it fits the door better than a larger one. Second, we couldn't afford the expensive store wreaths and we didn't have time to make one. And... we love the little jingling noise it makes when we close the door to attend Christmas gatherings and parties.

The Tree

This is our magnificent 5'5" synthetic tree, purchased at Target for under $20. We were very grateful we were able to do so many things on a small budget this year. Marilyn was so excited for Christmas that we spent Thanksgiving Day putting up the tree and Christmas decorations.

Below are the basics we picked to fill out our tree. We didn't have very many ornaments other than these, so we put the tree against the wall and only decorated the front of it. You can also see the fantastic ribbon we wrapped the tree in. Marilyn went with a red and gold color scheme.

Here is the egg ornament. We have a new family tradition with this ornament. As you can see, it opens up and you can fill it with presents. Ryan decided that every year he would fill the egg with jewelry and surprises for Marilyn. This year he was sneaky and did the shopping and filling while Marilyn was flying in and out of Chicago for auditions.

This is our "first Christmas married" ornament. We knew it was perfect for us when we saw it, although a little kitschy. It was the turtledoves. Ryan has often said we must have been turtledoves in a previous life. We love to stand with our heads together and coo. Yes, we're sappy romantics!

This is our Kelly fairy. Kelly loves fairies and we love Kelly. We bought this fairy in Doylestown, PA on our family vacation (too short!) the week before Christmas. We will remember how much fun we had every time we hang her on our Christmas tree.

The pickle is a Smith family tradition from Germany. In German homes, the parents hide the pickle somewhere on the tree. Whichever child finds it first gets an extra present. We hope their pickles are smaller than ours, because this one is not too hard to find.

These next few ornaments were gifts from Mom Smith. The Salt Lake Temple is where both Ryan and Marilyn received their endowments, and the Provo Temple was where we were married. The missionary ornament is reminding us of Ryan's mission in Japan. The two little children are our baptism ornaments. Mom had to special order the little brunette for me.

I have not included pictures of our angels, but we have a few. We have a small "choir of angels," three figures with musical instruments, which were on sale at Target. (We shop there a lot.) We have two beautiful hand-sewn angels from Jen's mother, and our last little angel is an ornament from Nancy's wedding reception tree. We felt like we had a pretty well-trimmed tree with all these angels!

Our First Nativity

We were really excited this Christmas to get a few nice things of our own to decorate with. We loved this Nativity set the moment we saw it because the figures are so youthful and fun. It sits in our front entrance on top of Marilyn's cedar chest, on top of a beautiful table runner Marilyn found on sale at Target. (Marilyn has a small tradition of placing the wise men on the right of the stable "because they came from the East.")

Here is some more detail of the little figurines. Aren't they adorable?

The much anticipated blog is here!

Welcome family and friends to the Smith family blog. We have long planned to begin this blog site as soon as we had a good camera. Our present to ourselves this year is a good Canon, on the recommendation of Robyn. We want you to feel as close as if we lived next door. And in the coming years with moves, children, and such we have decided to keep a very up-to-date blog so you can feel at home with us wherever we are. This will be a little more work for us than constantly sending pictures and video clips in your emails, but we think the result will be more pleasing in the long run. So, please enjoy some crazy fun pictures and videos from our home to yours. We love you all!