Our Christmas

We have had a wonderful couple of days home with our mothers, TJ and Carol. Both came into town to spend Christmas with Marcus, Abby and I. Together we all joked that Abby was the free entertainment- she was just so excited to have twice her normal audience!

We took her at 8 AM on Christmas Eve to have her picture taken with Santa. We had tried the day before but the wait was 2.5 hours! We had told her about taking her picture with Santa and asked her what she would say to him. We were told, "thank you", "Jesus loves me" and "Hallelujah". In reality, she wouldn't utter a word or even look at him. She was quietly terrified!

We did have no problem making and eating sugar cookies for Santa. She did a good job laying them on the cookie sheet and helping me with the sprinkles. Unfortunately, we forgot to put them out! Santa didn't notice!

Our family and Moms went to Christmas Eve service at church Friday night. We have a new pastor and this was his first holiday service. It was just wonderful. We loved the service, at least what we were able to focus on! It was Abby's first time in the big service and she was not easily contained!

After the service, we came home to soup in the crockpot and opened presents from each other in our pajamas. Abby loved delivering and helping to open gifts. It took her no time at all to learn how to open the boxes. No gift was safe! We gave her a new Cookie Monster, Yo Gabba Gabba DVD, Christmas book, Melissa & Doug cookie set, and some CDs of children's songs for the car.

We put Abby to bed and played games. I bought Marcus a table top shuffleboard game and we played it all together. Poor Marcus lost at his own Christmas present :)

After we went to bed, Santa and Santa Mimi delivered presents to Abby! Luckily, he had delivered her new toy chest early so it was all put together and ready to hold gifts. Santa brought Abby a shopping cart, new winter clothes, a tea set, Barbie doll, bumblebee backpack, and new sippy cups.

We had told Abby Santa was coming overnight and bringing her surprises so she was excited to come into the living room on Christmas morning. We were up by 7!

She was immediately drawn to her baby doll with stroller from Mimi and her shopping cart. She would push it around the house saying, "I'm going shopping". Hmm, has she heard that before?

Her baby doll was almost as big as her! She has had fun taking care of her. It is sweet to see her do some of the things we do with her with her baby doll.

On Saturday afternoon, we were going a little stir crazy and thought our Moms who live alone could use a little quiet time, so we drove about 30 minutes away to visit my Dad, step mom, and her Mom, Midge. We were delivering a gift to Midge and holiday cheer to all!

Abby helped Midge open her gift and made us all laugh in the process. She had a fresh audience and was "on". We are celebrating Christmas with the rest of my immediate family on Tuesday night with pizza! It worked perfectly into our holiday plans.

From our family to yours, we hope you had a wonderful holiday season and enjoyed the many gifts given to you by family, friends, and our Lord Jesus.