Christmas 2009

Christmas Christmas Christmas. It's one of my favorite times of the year. This year, I was able to spend lots of time at home. I almost felt like I was a student again! Just another perk of my job. :)

There are lots of little traditions that we have, but some of my occur on Christmas Eve. My church has a Christmas Eve service...I LOVE candlelight services...and afterwards, my family always invites a group of people over for dinner . There's nothing super fancy about it. Just people, food, laughter--lots of laughter, and if you're lucky a good game or two.

When I found out that I was going to be an aunt, I started making a list of things that I wanted to do with my niece or nephew. One of those things was accomplished this Christmas...making a gingerbread house. Emma Kate and I had a great time putting our little house together. We liked it so much that we made a manger too. Things were going great until she wanted to put Mary, Joseph and Jesus in the manger. Yes, I know, I should have thought about that before, but I hadn't. We had to do a little improvising with the candy we had leftover. Mary and Joseph were a little rough, but I was pretty impressed with our Baby Jesus...that's the most important anyway, right? :)

After Christmas Eve comes Christmas Day. You're just going to have to trust me that we followed with tradition and took a picture sitting on the stairs. They are way too bad to post for the public to see!

Children at Christmas...there's really nothing like it! EK got lots of fun gifts. Her favorite was the baby that does all kinds of things. Way to go, Santa!

I didn't have much to want this year...but since I haven't been buying clothes, I was quite thankful that Mom and Dad came through with lots of them. It was especially nice when I was packing a few days later and had some new things to wear! Then, when I thought all the unwrapping was done, Mom and Dad surprised me with something that I can use to wash and dry all my new clothes!! I had planned on purchasing a washer and dryer, but was so excited to not have to do that. They are both SUPER nice!! Woohoo for clothes..and being able to keep them clean and dry!

The next few days were spent lounging around the house, watching football games, getting work stuff organized and preparing myself to chaperone a youth ski trip to North Carolina. It's a hard life, but someone has to do it. :)