author's note: Late post, but I wrote this as a cmas gift for my friend. You'll probably see more of my particular Swan-Mills family AU (as well as some other versions...) because it's my happy place to write. Enjoy the fluff!

It's Christmas Eve and Emma can't figure out why it feels so different.

It can't be the house, as they're still in the same one they've been in for the past five years, 108 on Mifflin Street in Storybrooke, Maine.

It can't be her family, as it's been the four of them for the past three... no, nearly four years now, god it is a little weird to think that Sophie's already four, but that's not what's making Emma feel a little bit off.

It can't be the lack of a white Christmas because it's snowing now, these stupidly big, wet flakes that are sticking to the trees outside. If it continues like this, she's sure there will be at least a foot of the stuff by morning.

Henry's always opened one gift on Christmas Eve night so after Mal and Lily have gone home after dinner, desert, and a nightcap, they gather around the tree to pick out gifts. It's Henry's personal tradition (Sophie tends to go with whichever present strikes her fancy the most in the moment) to open up the gift from his grandmother, a tradition started from back when she used to only be known as Mary Margaret, not Snow White and certainly not as family.

A lot had changed since then and it seems so long ago that the clock at town center had started to tick.

It's past Sophie's bedtime by two hours, Emma checks her watch, and the little girl has been nodding off since dinner, tucked into Regina's side like a little chick under the breast of a hen. It was really only because of the holiday that she was even allowed up at this time and she had asked so very politely that Emma had melted at one blink of those large, sweet brown eyes beneath golden lashes.

Henry had rolled his eyes and coughed something like "push-overs" under his breath when both of his mothers had sighed and rolled over before Sophie could even begin to beg in earnest. Emma had pinched the back of his arm only hard enough to make him glare at her and swat her away.

Emma jostles her shoulder into Henry's. "Come on Hen, what's the hold up?" she asks (and Sophie had been the first one to call Henry that, his name too much of a mouthful for her in the beginning), nodding her chin towards the pristine wrapping around the rectangular box. It's pretty average in size, looks like a box that might hold an article of clothing.

The wrapping paper itself is a little... questionable, but it is Snow, after all.

So there are birds on it.

Little, puffed up birds wearing scarves with snow on their feathers, row after row of them.

Regina wrinkles her nose at it, only slightly, but Sophie, ever aware like only four-year-olds can be, notices and scrunches up her nose, too. Emma taps her on the tip of it with on finger and grins when Sophie goes crossed-eyed and starts to giggle.

"Did she write you a whole novel on that, dear?" Regina asks finally, looking to Henry who is still pouring over still wrapped present, holding the tag up to the lights on the Christmas tree to read it.

"No... There are instructions. It's a gift for all of us so we need to open four of them up all at the same time," Henry says. He turns to his sister. "Hey Soph, help me find the other gifts under the tree with birds on them."

Suddenly looking much more awake at the prospect of opening gifts, Sophie crawls around under the tree and pushes out three more matching boxes.

"Good job, sweetheart," Regina says, taking the one handed to her and checking the tag. It's correct of course, Sophie's been able to read all of their names since she was three and she follows along with Emma impressively every time Emma's selected to read the bedtime story. (Lately her reader of choice has been her older brother.)

"Do we open them up all at once or are there more instructions?" Emma asks when she gets her box placed into her lap. She's sitting on the end of the couch while the rest of her family has settled on the floor. Regina's got her back against the couch and Emma pushes her cold toes under Regina's backside until her wife notices and flicks at her ankle with a cool fingertip. Emma doesn't withdraw her foot and wiggles her toes instead.

"We can open them all at once, I'm pretty sure," Henry says, saving Emma from getting a scolding. He checks the gift tag one more time and nods to himself. "Everyone ready?"

"Ready!" Sophie chimes.

Henry looks around at all of them before saying, "Ready, set, go!"

He gets his open first, of course. Emma's still marveling a little at the perfect corners on her box (She never got presents like this as a kid.) when she hears him utter a quiet "Oh no." under his breath and it makes her look up. He's not pulling his gift out of the box.

Sophie's still wrestling with the wrapping on her box and there's already tape in her hair.

Regina's lifting her gift up with a unreadable expression except that none of her looks are unreadable to Emma by now and this one looks very reminiscent of her Evil Queen days. Emma's never seen the Queen in her full regalia, but she overpowers even Mayor Mills at her worst and back then Emma hadn't met another woman like her. (Still hasn't, to this day.)

Sophie's nudging Regina and asking for help so the look is short-lived. That is, until Sophie's present is opened.

"Tweety Bird!" Sophie squeals, and hugs the bright canary yellow material to her chest.

"What is it Soph?" Emma asks though she's fairly sure she doesn't want to know.

"Hold it up so Mama can see it," Regina says her voice light and just enough strained that both Emma and Henry notice.

Emma doubts that her Bug was ever that brightly yellow, even when it was new.

It's a footsie pajama, complete with a hood that is the canary character's face. Sophie skips off to put it on and takes Regina by the hand to put on her pajamas, too.

This is a new approach from Mary Margaret. Emma's heard of matching PJ sets being a thing that some families do on Christmas Eve, but it had never been a Charming family tradition, at least not to her knowledge.

"Let me see the damage," Emma says once they've gone out of the room and left her and Henry beside the tree. Henry holds up his set. It isn't bad, but it isn't good either, cartoon birds from the popular game of Angry Birds cover the long-sleeved shirt and matching pants.

Henry is frowning at the print. "Does she think I have anger management problems or just that I still like this game? Because I liked it when I was, like, ten..."

Emma chuckles and reaches to ruffle his hair. Henry knows this move well by now and easily dodges out of the way.

"Pretty sure she just remembers you as still being ten, kid. You grew up way too fast for most of our liking," Emma says.

"Yeah, yeah," Henry mutters, but he's smiling at her also. So.

"What's yours?" he asks and Emma glances to her unopened box in her lap and starts to unwrap it. Henry laughs at her, right off the bat.

"What?" she asks, feigning offense and pouting at him. He only laughs harder and elbows her.

"Ma, come on. You gotta rip it," he tells her.

"Why?"

"You just gotta."

Emma rolls her eyes and rips into the gift. Her phone's been vibrating back on the kitchen counter and when she checks on it, it's a few text messages from her mother asking if they've opened their Christmas Eve gifts yet. The last one requests a photo. Emma sighs and sets her phone back down and looks at the folded up pajamas under her arm.

"Emma dear? Is everything okay?"

The blonde looks up to see her wife leaning in the door frame of the kitchen. She's rosy cheeked and dressed in her new sleepwear. For all of Snow's... questionable... choices in gifting, Regina's is the easiest on the eyes. The material looks soft and is patterned with colorful owls.

"Yeah it's just my mom being, well, herself." Emma smiles then and steps around the kitchen island. Regina's pajama material is soft when she gets her hands on it.

"The princess would like you to see her outfit," Regina murmurs before Emma can get too handsy.

Emma slides her arms around her wife anyway, holding her from behind and watches their daughter spring into the living room. Emma knows that Sophie's going for a ballet leap, but since she has all the grace of a newborn fawn, it falls short.

Emma hides a laugh into Regina's neck. It's the brunette's ticklish spot and so she giggles into her hand.

"That sure is something, princess," Emma comments. "Are you sure it's Tweety Bird?"

"Yes! Who else would it be?"

"Oh, I don't know." Emma blows into Regina's ear and Regina snorts and pushes her away playfully. Emma sinks back onto the couch. "You could be that bird... what's his name? From Charlie Brown."

"Woodstock?" Henry offers, coming out from the downstairs half bath. He's dressed in his Angry Bird pajamas, too.

Sophie throws herself onto the couch and laughs. "I'm not Woodstock! That's just silly, Mama!"

"But I thought you were silly!" Emma exclaims. A tickling session ensues, Henry jumping right in on the action until Regina gets him behind the knees, and once it's over with Emma asks Regina for her phone.

She starts directing their children. "Grandma wants a picture of you all in your PJ sets, so why don't you all stand in front of the tree and-"

"Oh no you don't-" Regina starts, snatching the phone out of Emma's hand.

Henry directs Emma towards the bathroom. "Nice try, Ma, but you're not getting out of this one."

"I'll just take the picture, it's fine," Emma says though she knows she's already lost this one.

"Get dressed, Miss Swan!" Regina calls from behind him.

"That's Mrs. Swan-Mills to you," Emma gripes, letting her teenaged son shove her into the bathroom and shut her in unceremoniously.

Snow calls before they can even get a proper photo taken. Henry's run to get his selfie stick from his bedroom so Emma pulls her ridiculous hood down and tries hard to ignore Regina snickering at her and answers her cell phone.

"Merry Christmas Mom. Yeah, we opened them. Yes, we're in the process of taking a picture for you right now. Yes, we are all wearing the pajamas."

The phone gets passed around for everyone to say their thank yous and Emma is impressed yet again by her wife and the poise and diplomacy that she uses to handle the overexcited Mary Margaret. It didn't always used to be that way. (There used to be a lot more death threats involved. And curses. Lots of curses.)

David's on the phone now and his voice is warm in Emma's ear when she gets her phone back. "Merry Christmas, baby girl."

It took Emma a while to get used to hearing him call her that. She wasn't sure if she'd ever like it, but she truly does like it now. It's just very him. It's them."Merry Christmas Dad."

"Have plans for tomorrow? Other than family dinner here, of course."

"Not really."

"A quiet Christmas, huh?"

And that's it. That's the difference that Emma had been trying to think of earlier. The thing that was so different was the not-quiet that always seemed to happen around Christmas.

This was Emma's first quiet Christmas with her family.

There was no town in peril, no curse to break, no one to rescue, no memories to restore, no villain to defeat.

For Sophie's first Christmas, Emma hadn't even been in Storybrooke. Lily had hulked out on them and Emma had spent Christmas day in the real world city of Boston hunting down a rogue dragon.

The next year, there had been an attempted kidnapping. Sophie had been a much needed ingredient for a certain spell. Again. (All of the bad guys seem to use the same recipe book around here.) Christmas had come and gone by the time everyone was home safe and sound.

Last year, Zelena had been back. Because of course she had. That was a whole family-drama filled ordeal. Christmas that year had been... interesting.

"Yeah. Yeah, I guess so," Emma answers and her smile feels like it might break her face irregardless of the bald eagle pajamas currently on her body.

She captions the photo "birds of a feather" and sends it off to Snow's phone.

(Regina threats to fireball her phone if she posts it to Facebook. Emma waits until she is asleep.)