Christmas At Our House

Welcome to our home. Its snowing here and has been for days now.

Every time we need to go out, we have to shovel the sidewalk and dig out our car. But we don't care.

Its beautiful and we're blessed to have had a white Christmas this year.

The Christmas season has always been my favorite time of the year. Our calendar fills up with special dates to celebrate with friends and family, a few opportunities to minister to others(like our trip to Canada), and to reflect on Jesus' coming to Earth for each one of us. Its a time of joy and tradition, as well.

 Although we had various Christmas parties before the last day of school(Worship team party, nursing home caroling, my MOPS party, youth group party,etc...) it felt like Christmas could really begin once we hit the last day of school on the 21st.

It was a short day, full of fun and games for the students.

 You'll find out later in the week what I received a lot of this year as gifts. It really told me something about myself too. :)

 Our annual Couples' Christmas party. This year, ugly sweaters were required. Everyone was great about at least trying it...even if it made them go way outside of their comfort zone:)

 Some of us went all out. Period. ;)

 We had Christmas at Grammy & Papa's house with the cousins from PA...

 The Sunday School Christmas program at church...just a week after the school Christmas program.

 You can read about our curbside Christmas DIY project here

 There were big surprises at Nanny & PopPop's house on Christmas day...

 McKenna & Julie joined the ranks of our American Girl collection.

 On Christmas Eve our first big snowfall fell. Read more about our fun here

 We've been creating like crazy over here, especially since the big girl got an artist's easel & paint set as a gift.

 And momma was thrilled to get more latte bowls. I love this color!

 the kitchen in action...

 I told you before how in love we are with our first-ever real tree. I'm dreading taking it down because I love having it in the living room(we moved it from the dining room because we couldn't enjoy it enough there).

 Big girl's ornament, in memory of our beloved Obadiah who got hit by a car in September.

 My momma in law bought us this to remember our very first real tree :)

 And my poor sewing room has been well used but not cleaned up this Christmas season. We've used it for wrapping gifts, sewing last minute gifts and making other crafts. Sadly, I don't think I got any photos of the handmade gifts I sewed this year. I made them for teachers, coaches, and friends. I was super busy but I have no proof to show you:)

I did get a new sewing book{Zakka Style}...one of my gifts from Eric.

 Big girl came a long way with her Christmas music. We went to two lessons a week leading up to the Sunday school program and it really paid off because she was confident and did a lovely job!

 There's something so cozy about lights, isn't there?

Catch the first part of our Christmas Tour here.

 The real reason we celebrate this season.
Baby Jesus.
 I love my WillowTree Nativity.

I'll leave you with a few small gifts Eric made for the girls and I. They're magnets and I absolutely adore them!

The one on top is our wedding date, each of the girls got their own "daddy loves you" from him and the bottom right hand corner is me, blogging. How stinking cute are they?

He went above and beyond this year making gifts for everyone. He was so intentional and thoughtful and even made handmade wooden gifts for a bunch of teachers at school, his family and then the girls and I.

And the magnets were just teeny gifts compared to the other things he made.

Since Grammy was hospitalized on Christmas Eve (and Eric was in bed with the flu), we still have one Christmas left to do with his grandparents. But for now we're reveling in the blessings we've already experienced this year. It was a wonderful month of December and we're looking forward to the start of a New Year!