Christmas Traditions

This December has been one of the most exhausting and stressful months of our lives. But despite this, I still managed to get a few pictures of our traditional Christmas activities. One of the first things we did was head to the mall for the (totally overpriced and blurry) picture with Santa. Everyone was excited, including Tessa who ran up to him and said "Hi Ho Ho!" but then I picked her up to put her on his lap and the tears began. Love those kinds of pictures :)



We also found time for our "ginger bread" (graham cracker) houses, decorated with our saved Halloween candy. 



Notice Brans' new smile :)



We managed to squeeze in a trip to pick out our Christmas Tree.  It took us another 2 days to get around to decorating it.  This was the first year I didn't intentionally leave the bottom 3 feet bare.  Actually it was quite the opposite for the first few day, since the bottom 3 feet was as far as a lot of the kids could reach when they were decorating.  Of course as Tessa undecorated, I would place the ornaments she removed on the top of the tree.  It all evened out.  :)



We were able to enjoy a little snow during the month.  Perfect for adding to the festive feel. 



Tessa's favorite decoration was our little natitivty.  She played with all the Little People everyday.  So much that I'm missing a few pieces now.  Dang.



And then everything fun came to a hault as one by one we all came down with a nasty stomach bug.  It ran through the family for about a week, even following us on a weekend trip to Midway.  In the middle of this bug, Bryan was diagnosed with possible Melanoma in his right eye.  Like I said, it was a stressful month.  After seeing a bizillion doctors we have a better prognosis.  And we're hanging on to hope that many of the doctors have that it is something else.  Only time will tell.  sigh.




Luckily we all got well enough for Christmas.  So we made it to our Nonna's party, where we ate, played games and had the kids perform the nativity. 



Christmas Eve we gathered at Nanna and Gunka's for a Christmas Eve party.  We ate by candlelight and then opened our Christmas Jammies. 



It's been so fun to have a sister in law pregnant along with me!



Nanna found some darling PJs for everyone.



We made it home in time to watch the boys open each other's gifts to one another.  $1 Store gifts can bring so much joy.  Makes you wonder why you just spent so much more money on their other gifts!  Once we got them to bed the work began!  I have a confession:  I HATE WRAPPING.  I'm not good at it.  It's not fun.  And of course I had pretty much all of it to do that night.  bleh.  While I did that, Bry busied himself with putting together the "big" gift.  I think we finally finished with it all around 2:00am. 



But it was worth it, when excited voices were heard at 6:30am (actually they woke up at 2:30am first, but we sent them right back to bed!). 



Christmas morning was spent watching the boys excited by the magic of it all.  And I do mean BOYS.  Tessa slept through it all.  She slowly opened hers later on that day.



Favorite gifts:  Brans wanted Hulk everything.  And his wish was granted.  Lego hulks, action figure Hulks, even a Hulk pillow.  Ty got the Legos he was hoping for.  And Cason loved his Spy Kit :)



Tessa said she loved her purse.  Auntie Chelle was right on with that gift!  It's full of all sorts of girly things.



That night I gave the kids their Christmas Jammies I had picked out.  I tucked them into bed, feeling so grateful for a wonderful Christmas, a beautiful family, our current health, our warm beds, and all the other amazing blessings in my life.






And now we're onto a new countdown.  We're down to the last month of this pregnancy.  Halleluah.  Lots still to come in January.