Our Christmas

Pre-Christmas present opening... My Uncle Winn always out does himself with gifts for his great nieces and nephews (last year it was a Wii). This year it was an electric scooter for Austin, giant doll house for Adeline and portable DVD player for Bailey. We took dinner to my Grandma and Grandpa Claybaugh's house, had a nice visit with them and let the kids open presents.

My Grandma Marilynn always out does herself too. She got my kids a beautiful Disney cuckoo clock. It's a special thing because my grandma has cuckoo clocks all over her house. It's part of the experience of Grandma Marilynn's house; clocks going off all over the place each hour. Since she lives so close to Disneyland, it's also close to our hearts.

Adeline was involved in the performance of "The Little Match Girl." She got a whole 30 seconds on stage, but still so cute and fun. I seriously dropped the camera on my way out the door, so I only got a fuzzy picture. We had to order another camera and have it over-nighted so we had one for Christmas!

Caught Austin sleeping like this right before Christmas

The girls are dressed up for Halloween in December. My mom got these ladybug costumes on clearance last year and the girls love to wear them around. We've even been to the grocery store in them.

Christmas Eve was a perfect celebration. I got to host dinner and a program. We had our silly...Mom, Cara, Jonny, Tim, Shelbie and even Hudson did Mele Kalikimaka.

I find that if I'm taking too many pictures, I miss out on the moment, so I didn't get pictures of Tim and Jonny in their Hawaiian get-ups or Cami's boys dancing to Alvin and the Chipmunks.

Then we had our spiritual...My kids acted out the nativity, Todd and Lexi read "I Believe in Santa Claus" (a book comparing Santa to Jesus), we watched some of last years Mo Tab Christmas concert, and then were serenaded with Christmas carols by my dad, Shelbie and Alexis (both my brother's wives- the only females in the family with musical talent)

After it all, and much anticipation from the kids, we exchanged gifts.

We were so excited to have my brother Todd and his new wife Alexis spend their first Christmas night with us! Lexi helped me finish wrapping presents, while Todd and John played elves and set up a new play kitchen for the girls. Bailey was passed the whole "open one present and get stuck on it" stage. She opened each present with enthusiasm and kept them piled in her lap.

The Newlyweds!

Me and my girls

The rest of the day is pictureless, but went like this:

After presents we piled into the mini van in our jammies and went to my mom's for breakfast and to open our gifts from them.

Then we ran back home, got showered and ready and went to the rest home where my cousin's husband lives. Todd played the piano, the kids sang and we visited with him and other people who were around. It was great for the kids to see and opened a door for us to talk about less fortunate people.

Back to Grandma's where she reserved her church so the kids had plenty of room to run. Dinner, junk food and games ended our perfect holiday season!