Our Christmas!

Christmas is my FAVORITE holiday. I love all the work of dragging the decorations out. I love hearing the kids talking about their favorite memories. I love baking and spending time with my extended families. I love shopping and searching for that one toy that will make Christmas morning so magical.

We decided to scale back this year and not go overboard, as we have in years past. As I looked through the pictures, I wonder how we scaled back, but I am sure that we did!!

Our Christmas started with a little Christmas party down in Dothan with some friends that we went to church with when we lived down there. For the last two years, Matt and Kim have a Christmas party and we always try to make it. We always have a good time playing Dirty Santa with ornaments. It is always a nice way to get into the Christmas spirit.

The Saturday before Christmas is ALWAYS the family gathering at my Grandmother's house in Montgomery. We always have fun there. My brothers, my kids, and my little cousins always have a great time playing some crazy game in the backyard (and ruin clothes in the process.) We also play Dirty Santa--one game for the kids and one for the adults! Not to mention, we always have some great food!!

Tuesday night, Todd's parents stopped by on their way to Kansas to see Todd's brother and his family. The kids talked them into being able to open one of the gifts from them. We also wanted them to open the gifts from us.

Well, the next big day was Christmas Eve! We made graham cracker houses, went out to dinner, watched a movie, fed the reindeer, and snuggled in bed, hoping to have visions of sugarplums dance in our heads--no such luck! Well, first we heard bells outside, so we had to get out of bed to find out exactly was going on. We did find bells outside! Later, we found out that Santa made a fly over and there were still to many children awake in Alabama so he headed over to Mississippi and the bells were part of Cupid's harness fell off and hit our house! Well, the kids slept very little that night, which meant that I got very little sleep that night. I love the excitement though!

So, here is our Christmas in pictures. Sorry there are so many, but I love them all, and could not just pick a few. Our big family gift was a Wii! We have been having so much fun with it!

Christmas afternoon, we headed up to Clanton to have Christmas with my family. We always have a good time. Rett got Guitar Hero so everyone took turns Rockin' Out! We enjoyed exchanging gifts and of course eating!! We also played a new game that my Mom and Dad gave us, UNO Flash! It is a lot of fun!

Well, the day after Christmas that kids "NEEDED" to go spend the gifts cards that received. So we headed out to fight the crowds and spend those gift cards. While we were out Todd decided that he NEEDED to spend his gift card on Guitar Hero! The kids were happy with their purchases, so we headed home!

The next day we took our decoration down. I have always felt that when it is over, it is over! We usually take the stuff down Christmas afternoon! So it got to stay up a few extra days. Well, now we look on to the New Year! We are going to "party" at Ben and Alicia's tonight! I am sure there will be pictures! We are going to play Guitar Hero, UNO Flash, and maybe even Karaoke!