Christmas Eves

We celebrated Christmas Eve Eve and Christmas Eve with my family this year. We all got to eat lots of good food and were spoiled rotten!

We went out to my brother's family's house on Thursday to have dinner and let the girls open a few gifts. I missed the moment here, but Haven was sitting in Grandpa's lap. She also sat in his lap thru most of dinner (because I failed to bring a high chair for her), and shared his food (sometimes by putting it in her mouth and back on his plate - yum!).

My child has a mind of her own and no one is going to tell her what to do. This is sure to be a trait to be admired...someday :)

Getting the Zany Zoo out of the box

And quickly moving on to something else

Haven was out way past her bedtime, and this was our cue to go home...she was rolling around on the floor. Tired much?

On Friday, Amy came over and headed to church with us where we met Grammy, Grandpa, and GG. Thankfully, they got there early and saved the front row of the balcony for all of us. Our church has historically had a service for families with young children (which the three of us mistakenly went to last year), but the new pastor opted to do away with that service this year. So, while the service was great, it was long and not AT ALL geared towards little ones. I imagine it was difficult for any parent of young children to enjoy much of the hour+ stress of keeping your child from ____(fill in the blank by selecting from the following: throw things over the balcony, climb over people in the pew, scream, cry, etc.). Haven actually did very well, much better than I expected, but I definitely didn't get out of the service what I should have.

After the service, we rushed out of there to go pick up dinner we had ordered from Patrizio's and while waiting I realized I left my camera at the church. I gave it to Haven to play with and never put it back in the diaper bag. Sooo, we drove back up to the church, I ran in, and thankfully, the next service hadn't started yet and my camera was right where I left it. Then we raced home to meet everyone (my aunt, Donna, uncle, Tom, Brandon, Kim, Emily, Grammy, Grandpa, and GG) who was at our house. We had an issue with dinner (that I had really tried hard to avoid) and Dutch bit Emily...it was a stressful couple of hours! I took a deep breath, shook it off, and was able to enjoy the evening...I just wish it could have been longer.

I don't even think this picture does the ridiculous amount of presents justice. Granted there were 12 of us, but still, over.the.top!

Haven dancing to "Hokey Pokey Elmo" that Aunt Amy gave her

Barbie motorcycle...Haven loves it! Emily and Grandpa helped her with it all night.

Amy took a lot more pictures on my mom's camera, but it is lost somewhere (tear), so this is all I've got.

We are so thankful to have so much family to celebrate Christ's birth with. We really can do without the presents; the family time (with the wine, egg nog, and sweets) is the absolute best part!!