Christmas 2016

Christmas is such a special time of year for our family...it is a time of celebrating the birth of Jesus and remembering that family is so very important.  I know that these years are so magical for our sweet family so I try very hard to make them special.  

On December 6th, we write our letters to Santa and put them in our stocking.  Santa takes our letters, our elf Ron appears, and the children enjoy a little treat in their stockings.

We did so many fun things to enjoy the holiday season this year...we made gingerbread men during preschool with the littles and then, the bigs helped us to decorate them!

We made reindeer hats and made a special ornament for preschool.

Aren't they the cutest little reindeers??  They truly are so close!

We enjoyed our trip to the Gaylord and Great Wolf Lodge with the cousins (see previous post).  And we baked cookies for family, neighbors and the hubs' work place.  I like to do a platter of cookies for each department so they know that they are appreciated.  This year, B and I made sugar cookies and they were good and fun to make!

Finally, we celebrate with a church service on Christmas Eve, setting out cookies for Santa, and going to bed to wait for Santa.  And our kids must have been very good this year because he was certainly very generous!  Christmas day was full of opening gifts and eating our yummy beef stew.

Reading Twas the Night Before Christmas...

Cookies for Santa...

Matching pajamas...

I always take a picture of each child with their gifts so I can easily remember what they received so we can write thank you notes!  I always want each person to know how much it means to us that they remembered us on this holiday!

And we also supported one of our favorite charities for Christmas- it is all about giving!!!

Merry Christmas!!!

The Cousins Came to Visit Texas...

We always love to take a mini-trip around Christmas to celebrate the season in some way...my sisters contacted me a couple of months ago to see if we could arrange to meet up in Fort Worth and it couldn't have been more perfect!  We decided to surprise our boys with the whole trip AND seeing their aunts, uncle and cousins.  

After the excitement of seeing each other, we went to the ICE show...it was amazing (and cold).

We did snow tubing at the Gaylord...SO MUCH FUN!

And we ate brunch at the Riverside Cantina...highly recommend!!!

Then, we checked into the Great Wolf Lodge for some swimming fun while the hubs and Uncle J went to the Dallas Cowboys game.  It was their Christmas gift from their wives...aren't we the best??  My hubs and brother-in-law got to attend their first NFL game AND be without kids for a whole night:)  Uncle J is a HUGE fan so I think he really enjoyed it!

The next day, we ventured back to our house after a little more swimming.  We went out to eat at the hamburger joint in town and went to sleep.  The next morning, we celebrated like it was Christmas morning with present opening and a yummy breakfast of sausage balls, kringle, and monkey bread.

 We had to treat our nephews to some Dallas Cowboys shirts!

After LOTS of cookie baking that day, we decorated gingerbread houses before enjoying a delicious meal of brisket, corn bread, asparagus, and cheese grits (click on the word for the recipe...cheese grits is the only one from a cookbook and the rest are from one of my best friends- Pinterest).

K with her aunties:)

And we also celebrated M's birthday early with his cousins and aunts with his favorite M&M/Kit Kat cake or what we refer to as "Kitty Kat Cake!"(Click on link if you want the recipe!)

 

There was also LOTS of outside play with football/soccer/baseball games...

And movie watching thanks to Em's gift of the "Secret Life of Pets!"

It was a wonderful visit and we packed in so much while they were here...it was also fabulous to send cookies and gifts home to our Virginia relatives.  As soon as they left, B and M said, "We miss them already!"  But, we are so thankful for our time together to celebrate!!!