Christmas 2016

This year there was a lot going on leading up to Christmas - shopping, class parties, lots of baking, etc, but Christmas is always one of my favorite times of year, so despite the volume of things going on, everything gets done (or done enough not to worry about it anymore), and we all get to gather and enjoy time with family and the celebration of the birth of Jesus.  As is tradition, we get together with the Blands for Christmas Eve dinner, and every year Aunt Jeanette has us posing for a family picture with some sort of Christmas accessory.  This year we looked particularly lovely in Rudolph noses!

The Wiliams family hosted Christmas Eve dinner this year, and while the adults were hanging and talking the girls had a great time giving each other mini-makeovers and preparing a ballet dance.

 

It was an awesome evening.  We had an amazing dinner and a great time with family.  All went back to their houses that night and got ready for Christmas morning.

We came down on Christmas morning just before 7:00, and Cayenne was actually the one most pesty about opening her presents first.  She smelled the Busy Bones through the package and through the wrapping, so she was very anxious to unwrap her present and get a Busy Bone!  

  

The girls, Mark, and I enjoyed opening our stockings and our presents - it was a fun morning.

  

  

After we finished at our house, we got dressed and drove over to Mousey and Poppy’s house for more Christmas.  While Lyla waited for the Williams family to arrive, she of course visited the neighbor horse.  Lyla loves horses and would love one of her own, but since that’s not happening any time soon, she takes any opportunity she can to visit with and pet horses. 

 

We had a wonderful Christmas breakfast together then sat down for more gift opening.  Even the dogs got into the fun! 

 

  

  

The girls had spent the night at Mousey and Poppy’s about a week ago, and while they were there, they prepared a Christmas story play that they were going to perform for us on Christmas morning.  It was very cute and they did a great job!  Layne was a sheep, Lyla was a camel then a shepherd, Ryleigh was Mary, Nina was the angel, and Emme was the innkeeper/director of the show.  

  

We finished off the time at Mousey and Poppy’s by carrying on a tradition that has been in my Mom’s family for decades.  PB used to explain it that when we all had birthdays, we got together to celebrate the birthday with cake and singing of the happy birthday song.  Since Christmas is Jesus’s birthday, we had a birthday cake for Jesus and sang happy birthday to him on Christmas.  My parents are carrying on the tradition now that PB is gone, so we had cake and sang happy birthday to Jesus. 

We arrived back home Christmas afternoon and kept things pretty low key for the rest of the day.  Nina worked on building her Lego set for the rest of the day and Lyla “rode her new horse” for the rest of the day.  

 

We are so blessed to have more than we need, good health, and lots of love in our family.  It’s a gift in itself just to take a few moments to reflect on that, and more importantly to know that the birth of Jesus has the potential to mean so much for everyone.  Christmas is truely a wonderful season, and we wish any who are reading a very Merry Christmas and a relaxing and enjoyable finish to 2016. 

Family Photos

This Christmas we tried to give my parents something they’ve been asking for (well, to be honest, Pops really hasn’t been asking for this, but we’ll lump him in under the umbrella of the fact that Mouse really wanted this) - a picture of “the kids.”  You would think that would be an easy thing to do, but to get us all in the same place at once, showered, and have someone there with a camera - well, it’s just harder than you’d think.  Thankfully, Shen’s former neighbor’s daughter is setting up a photography business, and she agreed to take on the challenge.  Thankfully she was very laid back and didn’t mind that there was a lot of goofing off the majority of the time…

 

 

…and in between the goofing off, she accomplished the goal of getting some pictures we could give to my parents this year.  Thanks, Caia, for being so patient!  I love this family and am very glad to have some civilized pictures of us now!

  

  

  

 

 

Nana Visits

This past weekend, Mark’s stepmom came to visit for four days.  After losing her husband, Marks’ dad, just a few months ago, we were very happy that she was adventurous enough to fly to VA and spend a few days with us.  She went with us to McLean Bible Church’s Christmas Village on Friday night. 

 

Then after the freezing rain from early Saturday morning melted, we headed downtown to see the National Christmas Tree near the White House.  

Here is Nana with Ohio’s state tree and with the girls and the White House.

 

Unfortunately, weren’t invited inside (I can’t imagine why not…), but the White House did look very pretty from the outside.

Despite a rather long and cold Metro ride (due to track repair which we didn’t know about), we finished our big afternoon/evening in Washington with a fabulous dinner at Bar Taco.  Just what we all needed! We kept it pretty low key for the rest of the weekend and dropped Nana off at the airport this afternoon, and we were very glad that she took on a new adventure and came to VA.  If we promise Bar Taco and my homemade pound cake, I think we might even get her back again for a visit in the future!

'Tis the Season

After we got home from Thanksgiving, we got our Christmas tree and started decorating.  I always love when it’s time to decorate the house for Christmas.  We don’t go bonkers with tons of decorations, but the extra color and lights add a lot to the house on days when it gets dark early and the days are cold.  Cayenne even got into the Christmas spirit this year!  :)  She’ll do anything for a treat!  

Nina’s cheer team also had an informal holiday performance for parents and families.  They got to show off their competition uniforms and run through their competition routines for the audience. They just learned all their choreography, so what we saw was a very rough draft of what they’ll be working to perfect for their competitions in a couple months, but it was nice to see them all in uniform and a little glimpse of what their final routine will look like. Thanks to Mousey and Layne for making a visit over to the cheer gym to see the performance! Even though none of us in the family know anything about tumble/cheer, and all this is very new to us, we’re so happy that Nina is doing her own thing and loving it!