Christmas Day 2013

On Christmas Day, we woke up at a leisurely hour and opened our presents together as a family. Isabel was so excited to tear through the paper, and Eva was so good at being patient and waiting her turn. What made this Christmas so unique was that unintentionally, I had chosen gifts with minimal packaging to tear through and nothing that required batteries. Instead, we opened presents, got through the bit of packaging there, and watched their imaginations sore. They received a wooden train set, play food, doll house dolls, and lots of books. It was wonderful. We had our breakfast (I tried making crockpot French bread, MAJOR FAIL), and Travis spent most of the morning hooking up his new TV. This required moving our living room furniture and Christmas tree, so before we knew it Christmas was coming down to make way for the new year. It felt pretty wrong taking some of the decorations down Christmas afternoon, but I wasn't going to re-decorate after we moved things only to take it down again in a few more days. Once the TV was on the wall and working, we headed to Aunt Carol's for some Christmas soup and board games.

It was a wonderful Christmas season filled with so many smiles and so much excitement. We felt so blessed at the end of the day to be surrounded by so many good people in our lives.

Adams Family Christmas 2013

Travis got an extra day off this year, so we decided to have an impromptu sleepover at Grandma Adams's house the night before Christmas Eve. It was nice to get an early start on our "together" time -- and we made pancakes and bacon (our traditional calorie fest). We had a great dinner with turkey, potatoes, stuffing, salads, breads, wines, and all sorts of others I am probably forgetting.  Then we opened our presents before naptime hit. Grandma loved our surprises for her this year, despite the fact that I couldn't finish a part of one in time. I found a website where you can make your own print of fabric, so I scanned in an old handwritten letter from Grandma Parchert with her instructions for how to making a turkey into a pattern to make a Thanksgiving hand towel. It took a lot of swearing and some help from my husband, but I got it done. :). Some of the girls' presents highlights were new Megabloks (which they have played with almost daily since Christmas) pots and pans for their kitchen, a baby that goes potty, and sleeping bags. It was Daddy, however, that stole the show with his excitement over his new 50" TV. I never would have been able to pull it off without help from Grandma and Papa, so I thank them profusely for giving me the gift of seeing his excitement.

The afternoon was spent relishing in our new toys and taking good quality naps. And eating. Lots of eating.And wine. Lots of wine, too. :)

Before we knew it, it was time to head to church. Evalee told us all afternoon that she didn't want to get on-stage, and if she did she was going to sing "Jingle Bells" and not "Away in the Manger", so our hopes were not high going in. With the help of Amy, super-mom/babysitter and Sunday School teacher extraordinaire, we convinced her to go to her classroom before the program. We got seats in the front row, hoping that if she was sitting in front of us she wouldn't abandon ship. We waited for the storm, watching Isabel go from preschool chair to preschool chair in front of us in excitement.

Not only did Evalee decide to go onstage, but she also decided she would, in fact, sing "Away in the Manger." Sort of. Because she would freak out and refuse to sing the minute I suggest we sing the song a time or two, she wasn't quite sure of the words anymore. But that didn't stop her from slowly inching closer and closer to the microphone, making sure her big booming voice was all the audience could hear. Our five seats were shaking as we all held in our laughter in the audience. After the first song, Amy came on stage and moved her back where she belonged, which resulted in the world's biggest pouting face throughout the entire next song. It was a memorable performance, for sure.

Kershaw Christmas 2013

The official holiday kicked off with the Kershaw family Christmas. We had our traditional family breakfast, filled with delicious homemade doughnuts and biscuits and gravy served with a side of sarcasm and laughs. We opened our gifts - the kids were way too excited to take turns, so I missed a lot of them opening individual gifts. But that's okay - the excitement was palpable. The girls got so many great things, and Izzy was SO excited to open presents. Her first gift was some Snap 'n Style dolls from Aunt Ashley and Uncle Trevor. She loved them so much it was hard to convince her to leave them be long enough to open more. Grandma gave the girls Monsters University and a cardboard table house, so those were quickly set up in the living room and the kids scampered in there while the adults opened our presents. Grandma Kershaw received two canvas prints from our family photo shoot last fall - by coincidence - so that worked out quite nicely :).

The kids played with their new treasures all afternoon while we caught up with each other, and then it was time to head back to try and beat the snowstorm headed in our direction. When we got home, Travis put together the girls' new trampoline and they had a great time trying it out. Isabel sat and played with her Weeble treehouse all the way until bedtime. It was so fun to see them so excited.