Christmas Memories 2011

We had an absolutely WONDERFUL, peaceful, family-filled Christmas! I want to document all the memories here for the sake of journaling / memory keeping [because my memory just isn’t what it used to be and a couple months from now I will forget all this!]

On the Sunday before Christmas our church had an all-Church carol sing. They have all the kids [except babies] come up from all the Sunday school classes, stand on stage and sing with the whole congregation. Our church has 3 services on Sunday mornings and this was just the amount of kids from ONE service! It’s always a special Sunday for everyone.

Afterwards, I took a picture of the girls and some of their closest friends. They are so blessed with so many great Christian friends! 

We had a very quiet, relaxed week after that. No school. In fact we’ve done very little school this month. We’ve been busy crafting and shopping and baking and doing many other little things. I always feel like it’s OK to take such an extended break because we’ll have lots of cold winter days in Jan and Feb when we can do plenty of school work.

So on Monday we took the girls out for lunch and then to Cabela’s. It’s a bit of a drive from our house but we had never been there before and kept hearing how cool it was. It did not disappoint! It was a very cool, very fun store. We actually didn’t buy a single thing there, but just enjoying looking around at everything!

On Thursday the girls went to my MIL’s house so hubby and I enjoyed a lovely winter walk in the woods. It felt SO good to get outside and use my muscles!

I have been enjoying the glow of the lights for weeks now … I’ll be sad when we take our tree out … I guess I’m not the only one who enjoys it!

On Christmas Eve I prepped everything in advance so we wouldn’t have to do much on Christmas day. I got the table all set and ready to go …

This ‘bouquet’ cost me about $7 at the grocery store … then I just spruced it up a bit with some pine-y greens from our yard. I put pines all down the center of the table, then stuck small glass votive holders throughout the greens. Added red or white votive candles and voila, a pretty tablescape!

Our church did 3 services on Christmas Eve and just one on Christmas day. That way if you chose to stay home with family on Christmas day you could have gone on Christmas eve instead. So our daughters were part of the service on Christmas eve … they both sang in the Praise Kids group, then our oldest was one of the narrators. They both did an amazing job and did not seem nervous at all!

When we got home from church we took a couple pictures…

[Bob had already changed out of his church clothes before I could get my camera out!]

We had a fun and relaxing night with my in laws and brother in law here. We had pizza and other snacks, the guys watched the Patriots game, then we played Christmas bingo and Apples to Apples [which was a family gift that we let the girls open].

Every year on Christmas Eve we give the girls a ‘spiritual gift’. This is to celebrate them accepting the Lord as their Savior. My oldest accepted the Lord on Christmas Eve when she was 6 and my youngest accepting the Lord on Dec. 2nd when she was also 6. So each year we want to honor those ‘birthdays’ with a small gift.

This year I had made the girls some cute aprons and gave them with a cookie cutter, some sprinkles and a wooden spoon. I asked my daughter ‘why do you think this might be a gift for your spiritual birthday?’ and she said ‘because we could make cookies to give to someone else’. YES!! So happy to have sweet, caring daughters who really get it and want to serve others!

After the girls went to bed we brought out all the gifts and got them all situated under the tree. I was so tired and ready to call it a night at that point!

Christmas morning! I woke up thinking I was the first up, then discovered that my Mother in law and daughter were already up. My Mom arrived shortly after and then my other daughter got up. We ended up having to wake my hubby and Father in law cause they just kept sleeping and sleeping!

We had coffee and got breakfast in the oven. My girls were being SO patient and didn’t even ask about when we could do gifts! It ended up breakfast was ready by the time the men got up, so we decided to eat first while things were hot. We had an amazing breakfast casserole, fresh pineapple and a delicious Apple bread/danish thing that my neighbor gave us. Everything was so scrumptious!

After that we finally let the girls get busy opening things. We start with stockings and let each person go one at a time so we can all see what each other got. [Hubby was still half asleep! haha!]

One of my FAVE gifts … the girls painted 2 of these pieces of driftwood … they are beautiful! I have several items of the girls artwork in my home and always love when they make us something. They take art lessons from my FIL and are very talented [as is he].

When my brother in law arrived we did a family devotion time. We read some verses and the story of Jesus birth from Luke 2. Such a nice reminder of what it’s all truly about.

I was SO impressed with how good the pup was on Christmas! Even with lots of people here and food and gifts and all kinds of craziness she was an angel. She did so well!

Later in the day the guys watched the Celtics game. This family is so into sports it’s not even funny, so it’s to be expected that on holidays they will be found in front of the TV watching a game. I have learned to accept it. ;)

So I took some pics while everyone was kind of just doing their own thing. The girls played together with their new things ALL day! They never fought, argued, nothing! They were just do happy with all their new stuff!

Here is my lovely Mom with the girls.

My in laws.

Hubby and I.

My brother in law, Aaron [with Gracie]

Bob’s new ski goggles, he LOVES to ski!

Joy and I.

Hope and I.

My Mom and I.

The guys, all fixated on the game.

We didn’t buy or get anything electronic this year. No movies, no CD’s, no wii games, no ipads, no DS’s, no kindles, NOTHING. The girls didn’t ask for any of that and we figured we didn’t need any of that. The girls wanted, get this …. pretend food. And a pretend cash register. YEP! They still love to play restaurant and stuff like that. I LOVE that they still love to use their imaginations. I almost thought they were getting too grown up for that stuff, but they were THRILLED when they opened those gifts and haven’t stopped playing with the stuff.

Now, I’m not saying we are anti-electronics around here. We have a wii, the girls have DS’s … BUT as much as they would love an itouch, ipad, kindle, etc … I feel like why would they need ANOTHER electronic game device when they already have one? And I loved that they weren’t sitting there glued to a video game – instead they were PLAYING! I feel like simple, imaginative PLAY is becoming a lost art in our society. So anyway, sorry, that was my little soap box moment … hahahaha.

 

Speaking of FUN and PLAYING … later that day we did some Minute to Win It games. It was SO.MUCH.FUN! You have to try this stuff with your family. We chose 3 simple games and it was a blast! I took video of the first 2 games, but then my video camera died, so the last game is here in pictures. You have to get a cookie from your forehead into your mouth without touching it with your hands. [In less than a minute!] It was HARD and so, so hilarious!

So, that’s about all. After my in laws and brother in law and my Mom went home we just relaxed with the girls. We put a movie on to watch and of course *I* was the one who fell asleep. Just so exhausted after a couple of busy days. It was a very memorable Christmas. I am blessed and I am thankful.

PS. My fave gift that I got was a Rotary Cutter! Now I can cut out the circles for my fabric flowers so much easier and faster! I am SO excited. One of my goals for January is to get my etsy shop up and running so stay tuned for that! =)