Christmas Eve

 We spent Christmas Eve at our house (for the first time ever, I think)...opened presents in the morning and went to church in the evening.  Pretty low key day before all the craziness of the next couple days with family.  Dylan was pretty happy most of the day, and Jamie and Dawson were occupied with their new stuff all day.

Here is my handcrafted gift from Dawson.  It is an accessory holder (for glasses and jewlery or something like that) he says.

Jamie's gift...a holiday hug.

 We also got all the gifts packaged/wrapped and ready for the weekend parties yet to come....

Christmas Day

Christmas Day was spent at David's parents. 
Here are the eight cousins on that side.

Poor Dylan has had enough picture taking already...and there are still more parties to go.

Daniel usually has a super cute, melt your heart smile in photos, so I thought this face was funny!

That's more like it!

Giant Racetrack!

Caleb and Josie

Grandpa V.

 Silhouettes of all the grandkids for Grandma V.

Joel, Daniel, Nathan and Shontel

Shontel helping Jamie make her cool safety pin bracelet from them.

The next morning, the kids made a gingerbread town with all their houses.

Peter supervised

Daniel

Shontel constructing the houses

Nathan

Dawson and Jamie's completed houses. (I forgot to take one of the whole town.

Dylan sleeping during the construction

Day After Christmas



The day after Christmas we had two parties...the first at Janet's parents, then another one in St. Joe with David's side of the family (I lost steam in taking pictures by that point, due to exhaustion).
Here are the 15 cousins/grandkids.

Dylan really was a rockstar during any picture taking we had over the few days.  She may have been crabby in between...but happy when it counted!

Lydia likes presents, she just doesn't like to let you know it.

The ballet crew

Grandma and Grandpa opening their present (a photo session..with all of the kids/grandkids)....just what our family needs, more photos!

Back at home after the parties...David and Dawson set up the racetrack and Jamie practiced singing with her new karaoke machine. 
It was a fun and busy Christmas weekend!

Holiday Nights & Visit From Cousins

On Tuesday night, after all the parties were over from the last three days...Dawson, Jamie and I went to Holiday Nights at Greenfield Village/Henry Ford Museum, with Grandpa and Grandma O. and all the Bruinwood gang.

It was cold, windy and rainy/snowy mixed...but the kids seemed to have a good time and it was a very crowded and popular place to be.

David and Dylan stayed home and partied there.

Here are some photos that Grandpa O. took:

Dawson and Kelsey

Watching fireworks at the end of the night.

 Then,

Then, the Bruinwoods stayed the night at our house and in the morning they helped Jamie test out her new Just Dance game for Wii.  Taylor is surprisingly and disturbingly good at it.

Cheers To You And Yours

Merry Christmas!



Let the fun begin....
(We are having our Christmas at home, on Christmas Eve, before we leave for all the weekend family parties.)

 

Tonight, just before the kids went to bed (and right before we put all the presents out)...I was handed these Christmas lists.  (After asking for a month what they wanted.) 
Oh well.  Life lessons for them. 
It is kind of cute.  We don't do the Santa thing...but they seem to think that we go out and shop 'til we drop the night before we open presents and buy/wrap everything then.
I am also very impressed at the reasonable things they asked for.

 

In preparation for the weekend, we did even more baking today.  Since I am not working right now during my maternity leave...I figured I better get in homemaker mode and do housewifey things.
So watch out family...you will most likely see baked goods in your future.