Christmas Eve: Stockings.

With Christmas Day being on Sunday this year, we've had to improvise a bit with timing. It made sense, well to me anyways, to pretend that Christmas Eve was Christmas Day, and go ahead on the 24th with the usual parade of early breakfast followed by gift opening, then a lazy, mid-afternoon turkey and trimmings. But for one reason and another, that idea was tabooed.

This Christmas we have a two-day agenda.

Today is Christmas Eve. Food Day. Table is adorned. Spuds are peeled and veggies are prepped. Mr Tom is already suntanning in the oven. Dinner is planned for one o'clock.

Tomorrow will be the official Gift Opening Day.

All the excitement of Christmas dinner without gifts provided for an odd explanation to the girls, so we decided to get them stockings this year. A first.

And here they are, up at 7:30am, bleary-eyed and giggling, excited to dig into the stocking stash.

Uh, yup. We do have a residing Sheriff.

Nothin' like a good read.

Looks like a professional sniffer. Smencils. The latest in lead.

There you go. It's only 9:20am, and I've already posted Christmas Eve pictures . More to come soon!