Christmasy Activities and Other Exciting Things

Christmas Eve was spent at my in laws house. We ate dinner, opened and wore our traditional matching PJ's, and played games. It was so fun! 

My SIL Jocelyn blogged about it if you wanna see the pictures!

On Christmas morning we opened the girls gifts at my in laws house. One of Emily's favorite things she got there was her very own couch that pulls out so she can lay on it too. She is always sitting in it now!

After we opened presents there, we got ready and went to my parents house next. More presents! ;)

My mom and Emily getting ready to start opening them.

A couple presents I got were this new hat from my sis and ruby earrings from my parents. 

Yay!!

Emily playing with a new toy.

Michael was sent on a "quest" around the house and yard and this was his reward. A humongous sword from my brother Brian! He was so excited! Boys...

After we finished with presents and the Christmas dinner (which was delicious), my parents were kind enough to babysit Emily so Michael, my sister, and I could go see Les Mis. It was really fun and an amazing movie! Go see it NOW.

My mom got some good pictures of my dad with Emily while they were babysitting. 

I love these photos!

In other news, the day after Christmas, my SIL Tiffany had her fourth baby girl, Brynn!! Aren't these girls adorable?! 

 In even MORE news, my cousin Jacob got married on the 29th and we got to be there. We are so excited for them!! I will blog more about that in a bit.

Happy New Year!!!

Silent Night- Sung by Meg and Shelley!

Meg from O. is Me (who, by the way, is such a great friend- love her) and I have a special little treat for you guys today....
Have a very Merry Christmas!!

Our Fun-Filled Weekend!

Okay, here is my weekend update/catch up post!

We had a good laugh at Emily as she had her pretty little jacket on and then picked up my purse and started walking around with it. 

"I'll be waiting in the car!!"

We took Emily to the park...

We dog sat for my parents...

I went to a friends Bridal Shower...for some reason (maybe the angle and the fact I was wearing high heeled boots) I am towering over these girls. I assure you, I am about the same height or shorter than the rest at 5'4"! So weird to see me looking like an Amazon woman! Also? I am rethinking that shirt. I like it because it's loose but jeez, it really makes me look like I packed on the weight! But it was fun. It's always great to hang out with friends and celebrate!!

On Sunday, after church, we did a little Christmas decorating...

Emily has been loving all kinds of foods lately. Her new favorite thing is frozen vegetables! 

We love our little girl!

Emily's First Christmas

 

It's tradition for Michaels side of the family to get together on Christmas Eve for dinner and to exchange presents with extended family. My family and my SIL Sarahs family were invited too since they live close by.

My mom helping Emily open one of her first Christmas presents ever!

My sister being a good sport and loving on Jexi...

 My niece Skylar having tummy time with Emily in their matching jammies...

We spent the night at M's parents house and then the next morning (Christmas) we all opened our presents and then went to church. Afterwards, we went to my parents house for lunch/dinner and games. They postponed their Christmas dinner a couple days for my brother who came to visit on the 27th. It was great to have my whole family together for the first time in years! Emily loves all her new clothes, books, toys, and blankets!! I can't wait to do the whole Santa thing with her!

Holiday Craziness

I hope you all had a very merry Christmas! We had a lot of fun spending time with family. There will be pictures to come when I get a chance to sit and upload them but for now we are still very busy enjoying family and friends who are in town. My brother and cousin are coming tomorrow for a delayed Christmas dinner and we will finally get to introduce Emily to her uncle Brian! On the 28th we are taking family photos and then we will be busy this weekend with New Years festivities. Yay! So, enjoy the rest of the holiday season and I will update more when things slow down. HAPPY NEW YEAR!

It's Christmas Decor Time!

I finally pretty much finished decorating for Christmas! Everything takes a lot longer when you have a newborn who won't let you put her down for longer than like five minutes at a time but we are all set and ready for Christmas in our home! Usually we put red and silver ornaments on our tree but this year we were lazy and just put a few of our snowflakes with wedding pictures in the middle ornaments up and left it at that.

I love our stockings and the sleigh weights! One of my favorite traditions we do for Christmas is we fill up each others stockings. Michaels is always full way ahead of time and mine sits empty until like two days before...making me nervous as heck that he'll forget, lol. Poor guy, he works so much!

A pretty white house and nativity set on our china cabinet...

Another nativity set...

Our wreath...

Table runner with fall/winter scented candles!

There are other random things around the house but that's the majority of our Christmas decor!

A Christmas Party and Happy Birthday, Michael!!

We had our church Christmas party this past Saturday night so I dressed Emily up in a Christmas outfit. Adorable, right?!

I got to do my nails!

It was nice to get out and celebrate the true meaning of Christmas. Our SIL Sarah got to come with us too so that was fun. I feel so blessed this holiday season! I have such an amazing family and I love them all so much!

P.S- Happy 27th birthday to the best husband and daddy in the world! Emily, Jexi, and I love you, Michael!

Christmas Doesn't Come From A Store

On Christmas morning, I dragged Michael and myself out of bed at 8:30 AM (gasp!) to get ready and head over to his parents house. While we were there we opened the great gifts that were given to us.

After we spent a little time over there, we went to my parents house. Luckily our parents all live within 15 minutes of each other so going back and forth isn't a huge deal. My mom prepared her usual delicious Christmas dinner and set up the dining table.

Can you spot my grandpa's head in this picture? He was on the couch snoozing before dinner :-). It was so great having him visit!

Here's my dad carving up the turkey!

After dinner, Michael and I took a short nap and then we all played games for a while.

My sister is a goofball. She wouldn't take any normal pictures with me all day! Stinker.

A little later on, we went back over to Michaels parents house. They were having their Christmas dinner. When we walked in the door we heard everyone who was there singing a hymn. We were like..."what in the world...?" Haha! It was awesome. I guess they had planned a quick Christmas program with a couple songs, short speeches, and prayer. It was nice to get some spirituality mixed into the Christmas holiday.

Then we sat down for (another) dinner. Michael and I were obviously not hungry yet since we had just eaten at my parents house, but we had a couple bites of their yummy food anyway.

After dinner and most people left, us kids (ha!) watched GI Joe on their big screen TV. Tyler is catching up on movies he missed while on his mission for two years. I recommended Avatar.

It was a long day of fun and family so we headed home after the movie.

It was a great Christmas! I think it was one of the best ones ever. It was so nice to have Michaels family all together and also most of my family.

I think this year was the first year I realized that I really don't care about presents anymore. Like, yeah I am grateful and excited for what I did get, but I would have been perfectly happy just spending time with my family.

I like the quote from the Grinch that says, "He puzzled and puzzled till his puzzler was sore. Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn't before! Maybe Christmas, he thought, doesn't come from a store. Maybe Christmas... perhaps... means a little bit more! "

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Christmas Eve And PJ Fun!

Christmas Eve was spent over at Michaels grandma's house. We had dinner and exchanged presents.

Aubrey lovin' on Jexi!



Tyler and Sarah...

Jason and Jocelyn...

Tiffany, Jarom, and Mikayla...

Me playing with Aubrey...

After we were done over there, we went back to Michaels parents house. Every year his mom buys all of us new pajama pants! The girls always match and the men....well, see for yourself! 

Bwuahahaha! Nice job, Diana! She bought them all pants that they would love. This is them acting it out. Jarom loves football, Jason loves superman, Michael loves Call of Duty (a PS3 video game), and Tyler has Mario and Luigi (sp?) pants! So funny!

And then there is this not so funny picture too...I just love it and had to share with you! So cute!



I'm so blessed to have such a great family of in-laws! I love this family!

We Bring You The Gift Of...Food!

I hope you all had a Merry Christmas with loved ones and lots of delicious food!! I know I sure did! This year, money is a little tight (with buying a house and all...), so we decided to make a bunch of edible treats and give them away instead. We made a good assortment!

"Reindeer Chow"

Lots of Chex, peanut butter, melting chocolate, and powdered sugar.

Peanut Butter cookies. But not just any peanut butter cookie...

We dipped one or two sides in dipping chocolate and crushed peanuts.

This is brownie batter with choclate chip cookies.

They turned out looking like this!

Yum...

And this is your good old fashioned sugar cookie with sprinkles, compliments of Michaels mom. She had some extra dough and lots of sprinkles to spare!

We also made some plain chocolate chip cookies and peanut butter cookies with chocolate kisses in the middle but I forgot to get pictures of them.

We gave away these yummy treats in cute tin cans...

...and also on these plates.

So far we have gotten lots of compliments on them! I'm really glad people didn't mind that that was what we were giving away and that they are being enjoyed!

Three of these recipe ideas were found at www.bakerella.com.