Christmas 2013

The girls woke up Christmas morning in their own beds for the first time ever.  They came downstairs (of course someone had on a crown...we are fancy around here) and we opened gifts around our pretty tree.

After presents, we had breakfast and packed up our car to head to Jacksonville!

We were able to see a lot of our family at Christmas which was really such a blessing.  The girls have so many cousins (distant cousins, since Jereme and I are only children, but cousins nonetheless) who they love to see and spend time with.

Let's backup for a moment.  Our first celebration (the Saturday before Christmas) was with some of my dad's family.  My cousin's little boy, Gage, is about a month older than Caroline and they had a ball playing together.  Gage introduced the girls to some serious boy-style wrestling.

Once we got to Jacksonville, we spent part of Christmas day with my parents and grandmother.  We had lunch, exchanged gifts, and played with new toys.

Then we went over to the Stouts' house to do more of the same thing.

The next day we spent time with Jereme's cousins and their children.  As you can tell, they had a miserable time.

The conclusion to our celebrations was with my Mom's family in Raleigh where we had the best meal and an even better time!  The kids painted nutcrackers and decorated cookies!

We also had a toilet paper snowman contest (Jereme and I failed miserably) and here are the winners in all their glory.

With that much toilet paper everywhere, a party was bound to happen afterwards.

Emma Grace said several times "this is the best Christmas ever!"  It really was a great Christmas and we are so thankful for the time with our family and the birth of our Savior.  

Christmas Eve

This was our first Christmas Eve at our own home.  We have always been with family which is great but it was really nice to spend Christmas Eve and Christmas morning with just our little family in Greensboro.

I had been pretty busy in the days leading up to Christmas with baking for cookie exchanges, prepping for Christmas parties, and buying/wrapping gifts.  The girls heard a lot of "go play" from a Mommy that ran around too busy to give them much time.  So I promised them doughnuts on Christmas Eve morning (Jereme had to work a half day).  I didn't anticipate the doughnut place being closed, so we ended up at Starbucks.

That evening we attended our church's Christmas Eve service (another first to be at our own church!) and even though there was childcare for Caroline's age and younger, we kept both girls with us so we could all be in church together.  Emma Grace always seems to love being in "big church" with us as she knows this is what Mommy and Daddy do when she typically goes to her class.

We went out for dinner after church and then came home so the girls could open their new Christmas pjs and slippers.

The girls were pretty wound up but we managed to get everyone in bed at a decent hour so Santa could come and leave their stockings of goodies.

Then Mommy and Daddy got to enjoy a little bit of a silent night at home.

Emma Grace's Christmas Preschool Program

Emma Grace's preschool held its Christmas program last week on their last day of school.  I tried to not get weepy since this is her last one.  Ever.  Oh me.

Anyway, it was the sweetest thing and she did so great.

Following the program, there was a little cookie and cake reception for all of her school.  This is EG's teacher.  We love her.

And just like that, we got in the car and I realized her last year of preschool is half way over and I might even cry right now thinking about it.  But we smiled through it with the prospect of a fun Christmas vacation ahead of us!

Visiting Santa

Emma Grace's school had a breakfast with Santa a couple of weeks ago and we took the girls.  We had a delicious breakfast (where my husband played my pregnancy card and got us both a second helping!) followed by a reading of the Christmas story out of Luke.

Then the girls got to sit with Santa and tell him what they wanted for Christmas!

They loved seeing Santa and talking to him and we are thankful for fun things like this that we can do as a family!

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas from the Stouts!

Getting our home Christmas ready

We had been home from our Disney trip less than 12 hours when I told Jereme I thought we should get our Christmas tree put up.  Or maybe it was more like "this is happening, like it or not."  We had unpacked our car by throwing bags and suitcases all around the house, I had days and days of laundry to do, but the tree had to go up.  So Jereme boarded the crazy train with me and we set out the next day to the Farmer's Market.  This was the first time in years we haven't gone off somewhere to pick our tree, but after being in the car all day long the day before, we were cool with a 15 minute ride to the Farmer's Market.  Thank you very much.

We finally found our tree and even though it's the shortest one we've had in a while, it's also the cheapest and Mickey Mouse had taken all our money the week before so...

Somewhere along the way, Jereme thought I merely wanted the tree standing in our house.  Haha!  He quickly learned the whole shebang was happening that very night.  My dad has put the lights on our tree for the past several years, so here is Jereme giving it a try (and possibly grumbling that my Dad gave me high expectations for what lights on a tree should look like).

Our two little elves helped us decorate the tree.  Actually, they pretty much did the entire lower tree and Jereme did the high branches.  I mainly pulled ornaments out of boxes and held my breath every time they dropped one.  (By the way, EG is wearing a crown, a purse, and an apron.  We do nothing less than fancy around here.)

And now C has the crown.  All day long, folks.

And now for a little run through of the house.  It's not everything, but we'll just hit the high points.  This year I put up a tree to hold our Christmas cards.  I'm so glad I did as it's been a fun way to really see all of our cards...and you can never have too many trees in your house!

Here is our main tree.  We put it in our formal living room so it can be seen from the street.

I put up a small tree in our family room which holds all of the girls' handmade ornaments from school and church.  They have loved coming home and hanging up their ornaments.  Under this tree are our kid-friendly nativity sets and Christmas books.

And here are just a few decorations I've set throughout the house:

Some of my favorite decorations are things like this that Emma Grace brings home from school.

Every year we add a few new ornaments to our tree.  Here are a couple of our latest:

(I think it's obvious we went to Disney World this year since two are from Disney and I think there's actually a third somewhere on the tree.)

I'm just now realizing a don't have any pictures of the outside.  So close your eyes and imagine with me a large flag and a garden flag that says "Merry Christmas, y'all", trees with white lights on both sides of the door, a pretty fresh wreath on the door with a nice big bow, two small wreaths on each post of our steps, and a Christmas tree peaking out of the front window.  There you have it.

I love decorating our house for Christmas, but I also love promptly taking it all down.  So here's to enjoying it a few more days.