We had a wonderful Christmas with three full days of Christmas activities. The kids had a great time celebrating. The days seemed non-stop; as Greg and I unwound from the weekend last night, we thought through some ideas to make years to come a little easier. First, the highlights of our Christmas . . .
Christmas Eve service with family. Family gathering following. Home for Christmas pjs. Long evening of construction and assembling. Christmas morning followed by brunch. Presents with my family. Visit with Granddaddy. Christmas dinner and Landon's birthday celebration! SNOW!!! Sunday no church or power. Snowman and snowball fights. Christmas lunch with Abrams. Presents with Abrams family. Clean up. And more clean up.
Favorite gifts: Camden - microscope. Landon - pillow pet. Sarah Manning - sort shape blocks. Hannah Katherine - zoo animal train.
Favorite memories: Gingerbread day with kids. Making dresses with Camden for his gift to the girls. Reading Little House Christmas with Landon. Nightly Jesse Tree Bible reading.
Now, onto notes to self for Christmas' to come as a family of six . . .
*limit the number of gifts per kid from grandparents. thinking next year three per kid. our house looks like toys r us right now.
*plan ahead a little better. i really wanted to have a handmade gift for each child this year - i was planning on making the boys their own quilt and the girls a little robe. because i didn't gather it all together soon enough the gifts did not get made.
*prepare ornaments for jesse tree before december 1st. this year we continued with our nightly readings from the jesse tree. i had intended to create an ornament to go along with each symbol for us to hang on our jesse tree but they never were made. i'm thinking this would be a great family project over thanksgiving break.
*make sure Christmas picture is taken at least a week before Thanksgiving. this we actually did this year and it was so nice to not have to have our Christmas cards rushed.
*don't schedule all three major Christmas present openings back to back to back. the kids had so much to open and so close together i still don't know if they have seen everything really.
*go to grandparents. it was nice to not travel with the girls this year because logistically we have to travel in two cars and the girls are not sleeping well at all right now. however, there is something special being at grandmom's house and having those memories for our kids. next year there should not be a wedding the weekend before Christmas and the girls should be sleeping through the night.
*make sure Greg takes at least an extra day if not week after Christmas off. this year Greg had to be at work today. since we just did Christmas with his family yesterday, our house was chaos. we needed another day with us both home to de-clutter and clean up.
Well, we just packed up the tree tonight and we are now trying to clean up and organize as we approach 2011. We had such a great time celebrating the girls' first Christmas - Landon's 7th birthday - but most of all we took time to celebrate our King of kings who came a baby so we could have Christmas. Holy Christmas.
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