“Uhhh. What the shit?!” Odin lets out a long groan. “Good morning, bud.” He makes a painful grunt.
“Mommy! Daddies! Get up! Santa came! We have to go see it!” Lochlan is jumping on the bed again, and of course, the other two follow suit.
The best part is they would have never been comfortable, or felt safe enough, to wake their dad up or even come into our room at all. Corin would have started yelling or possibly worse if they did. I love seeing them blossom with their amazing personalities.
“Okay, my goofy geese, let us get up. Go brush your teeth real fast, and we will meet y’all at the door of the suite. Hop to it. After presents, Daddy B is making homemade cinnamon rolls,” I yawn out.
They all jump off the bed and go running and yelling down the hallway. “What time is it?” I whine, throwing myself back on the bed.
Silas chuckles as he checks his phone. “It's six a.m. on the dot, Wildflower.”
“Are you fucking kidding me? They sleep in every other day, and I have to make bribes to get them out of bed for school, but the one day I don’t go to sleep until almost two, they are up at the ass crack of dawn. They better be glad they are so cute and I love them so much.”
“It’s adorable how much you hate mornings.” He leans over and snuggles, kissing my head. “But it’s time to get up so we can start Christmas. I think I’m just as excited as they are.” He pulls me up so I can get out of bed.
By the time I brush my teeth and wash my face, the kids are bouncing around, yelling for me to hurry up. Maw-Maw and Ellen are already waiting on us in the kitchen when we make it there. I stumble over to the coffee pot.
“Angel…” Bodie starts, but the look I shoot him shuts him right up. “Bodie, I love you, but if you even think about starting to bitch about my coffee when I’ve gotten not even four hours of sleep, I’ll stab you.”
I fix a massive cup of iced coffee, adding in Snickers cream and chocolate syrup, because I'm an adult with the palate of a child. After I chug the elixir of life, I follow the sounds of giggles coming from my children. We made sure to cover the unwrapped gifts with every blanket we could find so we could be in here when they saw everything. Callum also set up a camera and had it ready to start recording so we could save every moment.
“Alrighty, kiddos, I want you three to close your eyes, so we can uncover your gifts.” We make sure their eyes are closed, and everything is where it should be.
We bought mostly things to put into the indoor jungle gym and got each of them their own recliners. Arden’s is Mario, Lochlan’s is Spider-Man, and Vivian’s is a unicorn. Those are pretty much the themes for all of their gifts, but if it’s what they like, then whatever makes them happy. They also got some kid-sized pop-up tents for ‘camping’ since they have been asking.
Arden also got a tee-ball set with a rebounding ball, an air hockey table, battle discs, Pokemon cards, and a ton of other different toys.
Lochlan got a soccer goal set, a couple of very large dinosaurs, and a really cool life-size Spider-Man, along with a bunch of little cars and toys.
Vivian got a bigger play kitchen that has a ‘working’ dishwasher, microwave, and an attached washer and dryer that also ‘works’, a rideable unicorn, and an absolutely insanely expensive Baby Alive. She also got a bunch more Barbies and doll accessories.
We have each of the kids' gifts separated in different sections, Arden's to the right, Vivian’s in the middle and Lochlan’s to the left. It should be easy for the boys to figure out whose is which since Arden doesn’t like dinosaurs.
That doesn’t include all of the stuff we bought for their indoor jungle gym room, which is equipped with a trampoline, ninja warrior course, a ball pit, and a huge climbing set-up. It’s like the metal domes schools have on their playgrounds. However, everything is super padded and safe for younger kids. We also of course have cameras and speakers installed everywhere.
“Y'all ready to see what all you got?” Silas calls out. A round of yeses echo in response. “Open your eyes!” All three start screaming and run to their sections.
“Mommy! Look a real baby!” Vivi comes running over to me, showing me her—in my opinion—creepy doll.
“It’s so pretty! Do you love it, princess?” I kiss her on the forehead.
“I love her so much! What’s her name?” she asks innocently.
I chuckle “You get to name her whatever you want, she’s your baby.”
She scrunches up her nose while she’s thinking. “I think I’m going to name her Honey.”
Callum comes over and sits next to Vivi who just melts into him. “That’s a beautiful name, Princess.” The look on her face makes me want to cry. She lights up every time someone compliments her.
“Thank you, Daddy.” She kisses his cheek, then runs back over to her gifts.
The boys are completely lost in their stuff. I look over at Arden, and he has a sad look on his face. I walk over to him and kneel next to him as he’s opening his battle disc set. “Baby, what’s wrong? Are you upset?” I ask quietly, so I don’t draw attention to the fact something is bothering him.
“I love everything, Mommy. That's not what’s wrong. I don’t understand why our real daddy and grandparents didn’t love us and were so mean to us. Why couldn’t he love us when our other daddies and Maw-Maw and Nana love us so much and are so nice to us?” He looks so broken, and it absolutely rips at not only my heart but a part of my soul.
I’m honestly not sure what to say to any of that. Before I can think of anything, Ellen sits down beside us and pulls him into her lap. “My sweet boy. It had nothing to do with you, or your siblings, or mommy. Okay? Some parents spoil their children so much that they think that they can do whatever they want to whoever they want and no one can stop them.
“You know how if you do something you’re not supposed to, you get in trouble and your mommy or one of your daddies will punish you? That’s because she loves you; she’s teaching you how to be a nice person, how to treat others, and molding you into the type of grown up that will treat your wife and kids how they should be treated. Your real father wasn’t taught that, and neither were his parents. Some people are really mean and don’t think about how what they do affects others. Do you understand what I’m saying?”
