Remember Christmas?

You know what they say, "Better late then never!". It has been a whirlwind of excitement for the past couple weeks. Christmas was just as exhausting as it was exciting!! As usual, we split our time up as best as we could.

Christmas began early this year, the Saturday before to be exact. That was the evening we spent with Annette's family, and we had the chance to exchange our make gifts. They do this every year, and it is something I recommend to all families.

Following that celebration, Andrew, Jackson and I celebrated our own "Chritsmas morning" on Christmas eve morning. We thought it would be nice considering we would be at my parents the next morning. Andrew and I exchanged our gift and then we gave Jackson his - this of course was after we had some yummy crepes for breakfast! It was such a pleasant morning and it made us even more excited for Christmas mornings of the future!

After church on Christmas Eve, we headed to my parents for our traditional Eve dinner and our second annual Christmas scripture/carol production. I think that has become my favorite part of Christmas. My Abuelita wasn't able to play the carols on the piano this year, so my dad stepped in and played them on the guitar - I loved it.
Once Jackson was asleep, Andrew and I headed over to his parents for midnight games. This is something we are getting way too old for!!!! We played this rag game until 1 or 2am; it ended because Wes broke the glass of a cupboard. In case you ever want to play, here's how: You have two teams, one team starts at the starting position, while the other splits up and hides along the pathway leading to some pillows. Each hiding person has a wet rag. As the other team tries to sneak across the playing field, in the dark, to gain a pillow and bring it back to the starting point, those hiding, try to detect some movement and hit the opposing team players with the wet rag. I am not sure how much sense I am making, so I will end there.

Next we have ACTUAL CHRISTMAS.... it began at my parents this year (last year it was at the Andersons) and we had a very nice morning. Jackson was showered with gifts, and like most babies, he LOVED the wrapping!

At about 9:30am, we then headed over to the Andersons to do their morning. Jackson was way too tired to participate in this one, but he is now enjoying his gifts! Richard and Annette have chosen to give us money the past couple years, so each year they come up with a new way to do so. Last year it was a scavenger hunt, this year, balloon darts. The guys didn't do as well as the girls, we kicked butt! But in the end, we all got our gift.

After hanging out for a while there, we packed up and headed out to Corona. I think we got there around 2pm, but I am not positive. Anyway, it was nice to be at our final destination and it was great to have Wes with us. A few weeks back we got together with my cousins to take a picture for my grandparents. I wanted to post them then, but I think you can figure out why I didn't. So here they are receiving their gift and here are a couple pictures from the photo shoot... they aren't the ones we used, but I like them!

Just when you thought it was over.... the Christmas celebrations continued on to Wednesday. We don't get a chance to see Richard's side of the family very often.... some we haven't seen in years. All four of his siblings came to the house and we were able to hang out at Vasquez Rocks and at the house. It was such a nice day and a nice way to catch up!

I have so much more to post considering we have had company for almost a week and we just got back from Brianhead, UT., but that will have to wait - I will give you time to digest all this!!