I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas...we sure did. For the first time in our marriage (and my life), we stayed at our home for Christmas day this year. While I definitely missed being with our extended family, I must say this was a great thing for our little family. Our plan is to start a rotation...every other year, switching Thanksgiving and Christmas day. We will head to my parent's home tomorrow to celebrate Eden's 5th birthday, and then to Huntsville to see my brother, sister-in-law and niece and nephew.
It was wonderful to have a lazy, slow day with just us. Nowhere to be at any certain time...and plenty of time for Eden to play with her gifts. We stayed in our PJ's most of the day, ate 3 hot meals around the table together, had homemade hot cocoa, and relaxed by a roaring fire and watched movies...including the Nativity Story. My favorite part is when the wise men bring their gifts at the end..."Gold, for the King of kings...frankincense, for the Priest of priests...myrrh, to honor your sacrifice." I love that movie.
Eden and I decided to whip up a from-scratch birthday cake to celebrate the reason for the day. It was seriously the best cake and icing I have tasted in a LONG time. We lit our Christ candle in our advent wreath and then sang Happy Birthday and had cake...it was a sweet way to end the day (no pun intended).
Okay, so the quote of Christmas came from Eden on Christmas Eve. The 3 of us were snuggled up reading the Christmas story and then we had this deep conversation and prayer time about how it's ok to enjoy gifts, but we can't let that become the most important thing. So a few minutes later Eden asks, "Why is there a light still on in the living room?" Gene responds, "Well, we might should leave a light on so Santa can see." Eden then says, "Daddy, I'm not thinking about Santa, I'm thinking about Jesus." We laughed for 5 minutes. Nothing like your 4-year-old reminding you of what you just taught her!
Here are a few pictures of our Christmas season. We celebrated Eden's birthday with her friends last weekend and Santa came...there are a few pictures of that, too. I cannot believe she will be 5 tomorrow!
Also, I wanted to thank all of you who supported our adoption fundraiser by purchasing ornaments. Your love and generosity overwhelmed us. Thank you so very much! We love you!
One of our Christmas card photo shoot pictures...love these 2 girls!
Eden with Santa at her party. We don't do big gifts from Santa so when he asked her what she wanted she said, a Wii game and remote control car. What? First we'd heard of that. She didn't get either...and didn't seem to mind :0)
He read "The Night Before Christmas" to them...and shared what the most important part of Christmas is...Jesus.
Group shot.
Eden with her GIANT dollhouse that daddy got the deal of the century on (thanks e-bay!)
Gene with his new Blue Ray player...that mommy got a great black Friday deal on (thanks Target!)
Couldn't leave Maggie out...unfortunately the bone wasn't on sale.
Lighting the last advent candle of this season.
Birthday cake for Jesus.
Okay...yum...just yum!
Happy, happy day with my favorite people!
2 comments:
That dollhouse is bigger than her!! lol.
Merry Christmas!!!
Loving your sweet stories! I was thinking of Eden and Jesse at the Mexican restaurant just the other day ...I think they were about 2 1/2 -- they just stared at one another with curiosity. They would so enjoy each other's company now - he turned 5 on Dec. 13 and is such a busy boy. He loves to look at Eden's pictures - calls her 'the China doll' -- I can't wait til he knows how true that story is!! Merry Christmas & Happy Birthday Eden! oh yeah, hugs to Gene & Keri, too!
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