Christmas 2007

It's been hard for me to want to blog lately because I haven't in so long. There's so much I wanted to write about, I don't know where to start! I was really nervous about Christmas this year. It's the first year we haven't been with my family. There are so many great traditions that we do with my family, I was scared we would feel sad this year. Who wants to be sad at Christmas? I did my best to plan things for us to do that would be so fun that no one (me) could feel sad! A couple of weeks before Christmas we had a Family Home Evening where we talked about why we celebrate Christmas and what we can do to make it special for our family. I had this idea to write ways we could bring love and peace into our home on some stars to hang on the Christmas tree. I will definitely repeat this activity in years to come. The girls did really well and I was glad we did it well before Christmas so that we could refer to the things we had written all through the month of December.

Here are the stars we made. They say things like "hug someone you love," "share with Avery" and "give gifts to those who are sick."

Christmas Eve was the day that made me really nervous. That's when my family has their big Christmas party where there's tons of food and a fun present exchange. We decided to fill time on Christmas Eve by making sugar cookies. I was really impressed at how well the girls did frosting and decorating cookies. They made a plate for Santa and they turned out awesome! We really had a great time and couldn't remember why making sugar cookies from scratch gets such a bad wrap. Thanks Brynn for the recipe, it definitely is a family favorite!

The window sill takes great pictures!

I think Avery ate 7 sugar cookies for dinner.

Ashby loves them too.

Roger thinks he's so funny. He reminds me a bit of Mike Myer's as the hyper-hypo kid. Or Stuart from MadTV.

Girls excited to leave cookies for Santa and go to bed!

Christmas day came and the girls were quite excited to see what Santa brought. I think he did pretty well myself! We had our traditional Christmas breakfast casserole and then went to an afternoon movie. It really was a wonderful day and I think the kids enjoyed themselves too. This was the first year where I didn't feel a huge sense of letdown on Christmas day. Every year after all the presents are opened I'm always so bummed it's over, it ruins the rest of the day! This year we tried to fill the days with worthwhile activities and I think it paid off. I felt very fulfilled and happy all through the Christmas season. I am so grateful for our little family and for all the time we have to spend together!

The girls with their favorites from the day.