Christmas Week

Christmas week was spent in a blur of traditions. I love that we have certain things that we do every year!

We returned from Alabama Sunday evening, unpacked, ordered pizza, and got to bed to get ready for the week ahead. Monday morning came and the boys and I headed out to finish some last minute shopping and pick up Daddy's Christmas present. Then we headed to Gainesville to meet Ben's family for dinner. Ben's nephew, Jared, and his sweet little family were in town and we were excited to get to see them! Ethan and Caden are completely enamored by Jared and his job "fighting the bad guys" so Ethan had a ton of questions. Jared was so incredibly sweet and attentive to him!

On Tuesday, we started with some of our traditional activities. The boys decorated sugar cone trees and made gingerbread reindeer.

 

 

 Love this sweetness but I can't tell you how short-lived it is

 Wednesday morning we had Santa waffles for breakfast

 

 Then the boys decorated sugar cookies and put together their gingerbread house

 

That afternoon, the boys went shopping with Daddy and Wednesday night they got to snuggle in their sleeping bags as we watched Christmas movies.

On Christmas Eve morning, we had reindeer pancakes

 

 Then the boys watched Home Alone while I made brownie trees, Jesus's birthday cake, and banana doughnuts. The banana doughnuts were turned into snowmen and reindeer :-)

 Then it was time to get ready for Christmas Eve service at church.

After church, Rylie came home with us and the kiddos had a great time "deconstructing" the gingerbread house while I finished putting dinner together before our annual PJ Christmas Light ride.

We were excited to have the Martin's join us this year!

The bright flash of the camera definitely made for some interesting faces on the kids ;-)

 Nothing beats comfy Christmas jammies, chocolate milk(it was too hot this year for Hot Chocolate) and homemade cookies while you look at lights!

Then it was back home to sprinkle reindeer food across the lawn, set out milk and cookies for Santa, and get to bed! 

 Silliness

 Loving brothers...can't believe it's not a tackle!

 Mommy and Daddy quickly put their presents under the tree for the boys before Santa arrived!

 Then Santa showed up, ate his cookies and drank his milk, then completely overtook the living room

Whew, what a week!

This is always one of my most favorite weeks of the year and I'm always a little sad when it comes to an end.