Christmas Eve and Christmas Morning!

 Christmas Eve this year fell on a Sunday and it was so perfect. I love being able to sing praises and worship together with so many other people--especially on a special Christmas Eve. 

For Christmas Eve dinner we had both sets of Grandparents over and Boose Boose. It was so much fun! We had a big breakfast for dinner, then exchanged "Gifts from the heart" (Jane was too excited to wait until the end) and did lots of music and singing together and ended with the Christmas story from the Bible. 

For gift from the heart Emma gave Lucy a box with pictures of Lucy and her friends/family on it. Lucy gave Jane a tied fleece blanket (avocado kitty print!). Jane gave Nora some homemade elephant suckers. Nora gave Reese some candy bar Twix dogs. And Reese gave Emma a glass plate with pictures modge-podged on it. I love seeing how excited they are to give their gifts to each other. So much fun. 

And then there was Christmas morning! Always magical and exciting. The girls run into our room at 7:00 am sharp! Some fun gifts the kids got were a balance board, t-ball set, polaroid cameras and "Bluey" shirts (the pickle gifts). We gave Grandma Close a big framed genealogy family tree--it was beautiful. And we gave Grandpa Close a book about the treehouse he made in his backyard. It was pretty special to give those gifts. 

Most of all we love our Savior, Jesus Christ. For the peace and joy we can feel through him even during hard time and hard days. I love my family so incredibly much. They are the best gift I could have every received...and they are mine FOREVER! 

Random Christmas Fun

 Making a Gingerbread village with the Roura's. Super fun. 

Lucy put up the start this year. Also, helping decorate the tree. 

Cade and I were on the Ward Christmas Party committee. It turned out so beautiful and wonderful. Our specific assignment was putting the music program/narration together. We had SO much talent in our ward it made our job pretty easy. I got to sing "Come, Lord Jesus" with the 2 Erin Bailey's again and I love singing with them. It's the most beautiful song too. 

Painting nutcrackers, decorating sugar cookies, and Reese with her YW group. 

Emma and her Junior High friends having a party at Ollie's house. 

Fishbowl Christmas party. Crazy how big and different the company is than when we first started doing these parties. 

Jane's preschool Christmas program. She's been going to the PEAC right up the street from us. She has loved it this year. Hasn't complained once about going which is very different from last year. 

Going to see the Musical "Elf" at Hale Theater. My friend David Smith played the part of Elf. It's always good to see him perform. 

Bleak Family Christmas Party

 Kristen and Andrew hosted this years Christmas party. This year we did the usual dinner, games, cousin gift exchange but we also had a family talent show which was super fun. Every family shared a couple songs each. The adult game was SUPER fun this year. My parents gave us all a certain amount of $ to buy gifts for ourselves and sent them anonymously to Mom and Dad's house. Them they wrapped all the gifts and we had to guess which gift belonged to who. It was MUCH harder than I anticipated but so fun!