"Merry, Merry, Merry Christmas"

We had a wonderful Christmas and hope you all did too. Unfortunately with all the to-do I didn't take very many pictures, but I did get a few.


We kicked off Christmas Eve at my parents with several of my siblings and their families and Davis and his FIANCE!!!!, Melissa. We had a beautiful turkey dinner and then watched a short little nativity video and then did a sing-along to "Hallelujah Chorus" which is always fun. The kids opened their jammies and we went home to be Santa's little elves. We tucked the kids in and most of them were tired enough to drift off to sleep, but poor little Anna only slept a couple of hours. The rest of the night she spent watching the clock for 7:00 am when they can come get us and begin the present opening. Brennan couldn't sleep either so he went downstairs to check on the girls around 1:00 and when he discovered Anna wide awake stayed down there with her for an hour or so and chatted. That was definitely a Christmas highlight for him. Mine was sleeping soundly in my bed :)

Nate in his new jammies

Ben and Abe aka trouble and more trouble

(These two felt Christmas wasn't quite white enough so upon discovering a box with Styrofoam in it ripped it into tiny little balls all over my mom's stairs and basement)

Abby and Anna

The girls came up at 7:00 sharp and woke Nate and Ben up. They had to wait anxiously in the hall while Brennan and I put a few finishing touches together (i.e. turn on the lights, start a fire, get the camera ready etc). Not like the seemingly 90 minute torture my mom used to put us through on Christmas morning. I'm pretty sure Dad went out and chopped the firewood and started it with some rocks, and Mom saved 435 candles to light for the occasion :) Anyway, we finally gave the go-ahead and they raced in to find their shiny new bikes and several wrapped presents. We took turns opening everything and the kids gave the perfect reactions to each carefully thought-out gift. Ben was a little bothered to have his play interrupted each time it was his turn to open a new one, but he got over it. He pulled an orange out of his stocking and started yelling, "Who wants my strawberry????" Here are a few shots of that morning:

Waiting in the hall

After breakfast and lazy time, we got dressed and went over to my parents for more presents, games, cousin time and food. Here are the little cousins playing "Ring Around the Rosies" with Grandma and Liza.

When we left that night it had started snowing - hard. It took us about 10 times, but we finally made it up our hill and then after about 7 tries we got up our driveway. We went to bed happy and grateful. Merry Christmas!