Christmas Eve 2013

This was going to be the first actual Christmas Eve we were going to spend in our own house.  We had actually never been to the Christmas Eve service at our church so we were excited to be able to share that with our church family.

Peter worked during the day so the boys and I went with Nana and Auntie Amanda to the mall for a little browsing and last minute shopping.  It was a nice low key day, then we came home so the boys could nap and I prepped a few things for the dinner that night.

Peter came home and we all went to the Christmas Eve service.  Our church has a candlelight service and it was a nice evening reflecting on the wonder of Jesus' birth.

After we arrived home that evening we pulled out the dinner that had been prepped earlier.  Growing up our tradition was always to have meats, cheeses, crackers, veggies & dip, and clam chowder.  So I served all that along with some fruit and fruit dip.  It was all pretty yummy.  And we ate the leftovers of all that for several days too which is always nice.

I had already wrapped nearly all of the gifts for the tree and the stockings so there wasn't any last minute things to do.  Peter snuck upstairs and had built the boys a little tent in their room where we could all cuddle in, eat a Christmas goodie and listen to Daddy read the Christmas story.  Of course their attention span is kind of short, but Benjamin especially really understood the real meaning of Christmas and why it is we celebrate on this day.

The boys were in their Christmas jammies and were super excited to go to bed that night knowing that it was finally going to be Christmas morning in the morning........time for presents :-)

Sunday morning picture

I think every mom always has great ambitions of having an adorable picture taken of her sweet family when they're all dressed up.  So sometimes I get brave, or stupid, and attempt one.

Most times it ends up with someone crying or hitting someone.  No really, it usually does.

But since Amanda is staying with us I had her try to take a picture of all of us.  Somehow we all survived and we got a picture where we're all smiling and looking at the camera.

But it's blurry.

Go figure right?

But you know what?  It's so rare that we're all behind the camera and somewhat looking and smiling, so I decided to post it anyway.

So here's our we're all smiling no one hit anyone but it's blurry Sunday morning picture.

And a few cute shots of my growing boys....

And okay, okay.....maybe there was some hitting involved :-)

Christmas Cookies 2013

Who doesn't love Christmas goodies?  It's one of the fun traditions of nearly every family.  Although it's a lot of work to get them all done, they are oh so yummy.  This year I kept it a little more simple than some years and just made a few things.  I made peanut butter Buckeyes, chocolate coconut balls, mint oreo balls and sugar cookies.

The boys were beyond excited to get to help me with the sugar cookies.  I reserved a special batch (that only they would eat, wink wink) that they were allowed to decorate all by themselves.  They loved it.  The control freak in me tries not to ruin the fun of dumping 1,000 sprinkles onto each cookie and just let them enjoy the process.  So we did.  And it was a great night.  The boys consumed lots of sugar, Peter helped me dip the goodies in chocolate, and we may have snuck in a treat or two ourselves :-)

 let's get this party started Mom!!!

 my sweet helper

 naked cookies, naked boys :-)

 they watched each other decorate, it was adorable

 just a little taste!

 must. eat. sprinkles.

 see my decorating mom????  Did I do a good job???

 yes sweet Jonah, you did great

 so did you Benjamin, great job!

 these two boys make the simple moments of life just so much fun!

 what's better than chocolate and Daddy?

okay, Jonah might argue that a spatula of chocolate is better, ha ha!