Christmastime

This year I wanted to put in some serious family time at this magical time of year.  I made plans and shopped early to be ready to spend time with my favorite people.

I let things go, like letting the kids decorate the tree with small input from me.

One night we hunted Christmas light displays.  There were some pretty impressive displays. It was such a fun night to spend together. I hope we can do it again next year.

Shad and Jack in their bowties on Christmas Sunday. I added this one because of the cutest little smirk on Jack's face.

When we got home we took pictures of the rest of the crew, Ella had already changed though.  That girl is lightning fast when it comes to getting her PJ's on at home after church each Sunday.

Bowties!

 On Christmas day we hung around the house and enjoyed our presents.  Santa brought everyone legos to put together, so that took up a bit of the day. Ella got a reading/homework chair with a box of books, reading snacks and a reading light.  Amaya got a guitar that she has been asking to get, she was at one time even saving money to buy her own.  Dash got a remote control race car that he had been wanting.  Shad had gone out to buy a Christmas present for me and while he was out he bought himself a spice grinder to grind up peppercorns for one of his signature dishes.  Little did he know I had already purchased one for him and put it under the tree.  I didn't tell him, I just let him open it on Christmas morning and we had a good laugh at it.  He is really hard to buy gifts for because if he wants something he'll just go and get it. I made traditional orange rolls and hashbrown pie for breakfast and we enjoyed one of the gifts given to us by our Heavenly Father the gift of family.

Jack's first Christmas.

Shad has been really interested in buying silver and gold as an investment.  When he saw the traditional silver cup that my parents give to their grandkids on their 1st Christmas, Shad wanted to see how much silver was in that little cup.

At the end of the Christmas break we went to the Montgomery zoo and looked at all the lights they put up there. I was ready for the kids to go back to school, but I didn't want all the fun times to end.