Christmas - Part One

What an amazing Christmas we had this year.... amazing for many reasons!!!  Amazing because of the fun and special times we had with our three gifts that we call our boys.  Amazing because we had Nana & Pop-Pop here to share it with us.  Amazing because we had my grandparents, the boy's great grandparents, here to be a part of our family traditions.  Amazing because we had both sets of the boy's grandparents and one set of their great-grandparents here on Christmas morning.  We were surrounded by family, all here to celebrate the birth of our Savior Jesus Christ with us and take part in the family traditions that Charles and I have started with our boys.  One word to describe this Christmas, amazing!!! 

My parents and grand-parents drove to Columbia early on Christmas Eve.  They were here before lunch time which gave us plenty of time to relax, eat lunch and take naps before getting ready for the Christmas Eve service at our church.

 Luke is never lacking in the area of getting attention, especially from family.  Right now he is the youngest grandchild and great-grandchild so he gets all the baby loves!!  GG couldn't wait to get her hands on him... she had not seen him in a few months and couldn't get over how much he had changed!!

Luke was dressed and ready for the Christmas Eve service at church so while I got the other boys ready Luke spent some good time with his Goomba.  Goomba was always such an amazing grandpa to me and my siblings growing up and now it's so special to watch him interact and love all of his great grandchildren.  What a blessing that he is still in such good health and able to be involved in our kid's lives!!

Here the whole gang is ready to head out the door for the Christmas Eve service.  Dinner was in the oven, the timer and delay start were programed and the table was set.  I don't get to use my fine china much so it was so much fun to pull all of it out for our special meals.  I wish I had taken a picture of the table set but I didn't... maybe next year.  It was actually sad when I put all the china away... can't wait to bring it out and use it again soon!! 

This was the first year that I "hosted" Christmas at my house.  We were in our house last year for Christmas and we had our special meals with just us, but this year, having company and cooking for everyone was so much fun!  I got so excited as I did my big grocery shop and had so much fun putting the meals together and making it special.  Christmas Eve we had Italian (something my mom did every year growing up so it only felt right to continue that tradition).  This was also my first time using the delay start on my oven... all through the service and on the way home I kept my fingers crossed that the oven would come on and the ziti would be hot when we got home.  Sure enough it did just as I had programed it to do and the house smelled amazing when we walked in the door.  I can remember years growing up that my mom would do the same type of thing and we would come home from our Christmas Eve service and the food would still be cold.  :)  After a very tasty meal we sang "Happy Birthday" to Jesus and the boys were both able to blow out a candle on their cupcakes in Jesus' honor.

After the kitchen was cleaned up and everything was put away we let the boys open one present.... their Christmas pajamas.  They were both very excited and happy about their new pajamas and couldn't wait to get them on!!  Their excitement over pajamas was so funny but I guess at their age it's more the excitement of opening a present rather than what is actually in the box! :)

Luke needed some help opening his gift that night and was not as impressed as the big boys were.  He was wiped out from a very busy Christmas Eve and was ready to be in his bed!!  Once Luke was in bed the boys helped us pick out a few cookies for Santa and they both carried the plate over to the table by the Christmas Tree.  We couldn't forget a cup of milk (2%, not skim... our Santa wouldn't have it any other way!) and we also hung our jingle bells on the door so Santa could get in! :)

Finally, we did our Jesse Tree lesson for the night which tied in nicely to reading the stories in their Bible about Mary and Joseph traveling to Bethlehem, baby Jesus being born in a stable and sleeping in a manger, the shepherds, the star and the wise men.  That night we hung Mary on the Jesse Tree and the boys were excited to hang baby Jesus up there in the morning!

It is and always will be so important to us that our boys focus mostly on what God did for all of us so long ago in sending his son to this Earth as a baby, to have him live a life without sin so he could one day take all of our sins to Calvary.  Santa is fun, the presents are super fun.... but we want the boys to focus on the most important present they could ever, ever receive... the gift of everlasting life by asking Jesus to be their Savior and ask forgiveness for their sins.  God did an amazing thing for us so many years ago and we will always make that the most important priority every Christmas Eve!!    

We all had such a great Christmas Eve this year and loved every minute of spending it with Nana & Pop-Pop, GG & Goomba!