Christmas

I can’t believe another Christmas has come and gone.  I was good about getting my shopping done early, as well as the wrapping.  We decided last year we were going to switch a few things up this year.  Em and the family joined us for the whole Christmas Eve party.  Steve’s parents were scheduled to be here also, but unfortunately couldn’t come due to health issues.  We were sad about that because we had decided on an Italian theme, and Marie was going to be our expert!  We managed to pull it off ourselves and had a yummy dinner!

I’m not even going to be humble, we make pretty babies.  And the one we didn’t make is a stunner too. 

Sal always brings poppers for the kids.  Kaitlyn especially loves them!

Do you like poppers?  I moustache you.

We were so happy to have all the kids there.  The fun of the season is seeing their excitement.  We had lots of gifts!

The kids wasted no time after dinner changing into their jammies and playing with their new stuff!

Livy and Lexi didn’t want their picture taken, so I warned them, whatever face they made was going on the blog!

We were so happy that CF made it and actually enjoyed the evening.  It’s been a rough couple months for him, and we now believe he had a TIA back in October.  That would explain the issues he was having then, and the great progress he’s made since then.  We were pretty sure we’d have to visit him at his place for Christmas, but he’s had such a turn around in the last month! 

Once we got Covert home it was time to get ready for Santa to come.  We scattered the reindeer food in the driveway, and got Santa’s cookies out.  We didn’t forget the chocolate chip cookies in a baggie for him to take back to Mrs. Claus!  We’re so glad Santa told us this is her favorite cookie!

Christmas morning brought lots more gifts and smiles!  Santa even brought Buster Bear his own Build A Bear gift cards!

 

We had our usual breakfast with Sal, and then we said our good byes.  Our next switch up for the year was going to Kalamazoo to celebrate with the fam instead of them coming here.  We used to do that before kids, but when the kids were little we decided it wasn’t fair to drag them away from their home and new stuff on Christmas morning.  Now that the kids are older we decided it was easier for us to go there.  It’s getting tough for Grandma to travel and my mom is weather paranoid.  So…we made a little adventure out of it!

My parents just moved into a cute little house and this was our first time seeing it!  Again, we had tons of gifts!  We go one at a time, at it’s a little torturous for the kids! 

Sof had hand made gifts for everyone from her craft night at school.  She was so proud of herself!

It seems as though no one opens their own gifts.  There’s always a little helper!

Sof was happiest about her Flapeez hat from Grandma Linda.  She would’ve been happy with just that gift! 

We changed into our comfies…

and then it was game time!  Boxers and Briefs it was!  It was hysterical!

We played pretty late and then had to go to our hotel.  Em and Steve, their girls, and Lexi stayed at my mom and dad’s. Sof was super excited to be staying in a hotel and was running like a mad woman when we got there!

We got upgraded to a suite so we were all being a little silly!

The next morning Em and Steve brought the girls to the hotel pool.  It was awesome to finally have some time to just sit and drink our coffee while the kids burned off energy!

We went back to the house for lunch and some hang out time before getting back on the road home.

We would have liked to stay another day, but we had to get back for Johnson-Culley Christmas at Ellen’s house. 

You’d think we would’ve been pretty partied out, but we sat down to play cards and before we knew it it was midnight. 

We’ve had a lot of fun this Christmas, and I’m sad to see it go.  Yet, there’s something very satisfying about logging it in the memory book and getting back to normal. Not just yet though…there’s still New Year’s and one last Christmas party:)