Saturday morning was Christmas Eve, and it was the day we celebrated with my family in Trussville before heading home that night. We had been up late the night before at the Christmas lights show, so we were all a little slow getting started on Christmas Eve morning. Savannah didn’t even wake up until a few minutes after 9 AM! Uncle Chandler and Aunt Jenn came over around 10 AM that morning, we ate sausage bread (a yearly tradition from Mrs. Dobbs…it’s the best!), and then opened presents. It was a fun way to start off our Christmas festivities.
Getting fueled up to open presents!
It took Savannah a few minutes to warm up to the festivities, as usual :)
Had to get a picture of my girls before the gift craziness. I usually don’t think they look that much alike, but they really do in this picture!!
It’s a little hard to tell, but Savannah’s hair bow is a Christmas tree. It is one of the cutest bows ever, made with love by Cici! She needs to open an Etsy shop :)
First up—opening stockings! Brooklyn was excited to find Dory in hers!
Inside Savannah’s stocking were tickets to the Tennessee Aquarium in Chattanooga! The girls are looking forward to going sometime soon hopefully!
Oh, this lawnmower! Savannah has never been very possessive of “her” toys before, but not so with this lawnmower she got for Christmas. Anytime Brooklyn touches it (even if Savannah isn’t using it), Savannah shrieks and gets super mad. We are trying really hard to teach her to share it and take turns. Hopefully she will chill out about it soon :)
Let the madness begin! :)
Champ and Charlie (not pictured) were right there in the middle of the chaos :)
This girl was so excited for it to finally be “Prissmas”!
Brooklyn did a great job of opening her gifts without much help this year!
Brooklyn’s gifts this year included several new stuffed animals (Clifford and his friends), a soccer goal, a new placemat for the kitchen table, a Curious George matching game, and probably several other things I’m forgetting at the moment.
Savannah’s gifts included a new backpack, placemat, new bath toys, a lawnmower, several new hair bows and headbands, new boots, and a talking Daniel Tiger and Katarina Kittycat.
Savannah was definitely more into the gift opening this year than last. She helped unwrap most of her gifts, although she definitely got tired and a little fussy by the end.
There’s Charlie!
Travis was “bad” this year and never sent out his Christmas wish list. He got quite the surprise when his stocking was full of coal and switches, and he got a gift card with a picture of Ebeneezer Scrooge taped to the front! :)
He did, however, receive some of the “best beef jerky ever” in his stocking, so it wasn’t all coal and switches ;) Rae Rae picked out some good stuff this year!
At some point during the morning festivities, we looked over to find Savannah just like this. I feel ya, baby girl! Opening gifts can be pretty tiring :)
After everyone was finished opening gifts, we got the living room cleaned up and waited for the Palmer family to arrive. They came over for a late lunch, and then we watched football and played cornhole that afternoon. It was a fun day!
Savannah took a nice long nap that afternoon after lunch. All that fun wore a girl out! Brooklyn was tired enough to take a nap too, but didn’t want to miss out on time she could spend with her Paw ;) That night, before leaving town, we got the girls bathed and in their PJs and hit the road to head home. We had to hurry so Santa Claus could come! :)
Gabby was glad to see us after being by herself for several days!
We had several Christmas cards in the mailbox waiting for us when we got home. I know it’s probably a dying tradition, but I love Christmas cards!
Santa Claus came!
Christmas Day was on Sunday this year, so we couldn’t wait around on the girls to wake up on their own. We had to wake them up at 7 AM so they could open their stockings and have time to eat breakfast and get ready for church.
They were both sleeping good!
When Brooklyn first got out in the living room, she just stood there staring at Curious George, Emily Elizabeth, and Jessie (from Toy Story) sitting on top of the mantel….haha
It didn’t take her long to get excited about checking out what was in her stocking! Brooklyn got a new pencil pouch for colored pencils, warm fuzzy socks, fruit snacks, chocolate candy, and her very own pair of scissors! She’d been asking to use our scissors a lot lately, so Santa must have overheard that ;)
Not so sure about this….
“Why’d we have to wake up so early to do this?”
Finally, after several minutes, Savannah decided to help pull things out of her stocking. She got very similar stuff to Brooklyn: a new pencil pouch for crayons, Finding Dory suckers and fruit snacks, chocolate candy, warm fuzzy socks, and a new sippy cup.
Santa didn’t bring anything too expensive or extravagant this year, but the girls were still plenty excited. They even got to eat a piece or two of candy from their stockings before church that morning :)
Ready for church!
Couldn’t get her to smile, but she sure looked sweet!
The rest of the day was pretty much like a typical Sunday. We ate lunch at Cici’s, came home for naps, and went back to church that night. We waited to celebrate Christmas with Travis’s family until the next day, Monday. Sundays are tiring for the kids anyway, so we felt like celebrating on Monday would make it much more enjoyable for all.
Christmas night was complete after sharing a bag of popcorn with Daddy in the recliner :)
Monday morning, we ate breakfast at Cici’s before gathering in the living room to open gifts.
We snapped a few pictures of the “big kids” in the recliner together :)
This was the best we got of all 3 of them…haha!
I got to hold Luke and Barrett at the same time for the first time ever. Made my day! :)
Savannah enjoyed checking out her younger cousins. She is always so interested in Luke and Barrett when she’s around them!
Michael joined us for the day, and he was chosen (or maybe he volunteered?) to be Santa Claus, so he got to pass out all the presents :)
Savannah apparently liked the Santa hat :)
We let the kids open all their gifts first, and then we opened our gifts after that. It was chaos for a few minutes there! They were tearing into packages so fast that I’m not even sure who each gift was from. Savannah got stickers and several different movies. We are stocked on new Disney movies for a while!
Brooklyn’s gifts included lots of art supplies (paints, a sketchbook, and an art smock), a soccer ball, movies, a Motorworks kit (with parts to assemble your own toy race car, motorcycle, and airplane), and a magnetic responsibility chart.
Carter enjoyed opening all his gifts too!
Of course, it was fun to snuggle babies while the kids were opening all their gifts :)
I’m not sure if this is Luke or Barrett (I know…I’m a terrible aunt, and I still can’t tell them apart), but whoever it is looks a lot like Cici in this picture to me!
Savannah was tired by the end of the gift opening…can you tell? She’s doing the universal “tired Pookie” sign—twirling her hair!
After the kids finished opening their gifts, the rest of us did our gift exchange. This year, we did something a little different and drew names. So, we were only responsible for buying a gift for one person (or two people, for married couples). I thought it went great! We could spend more $ on our one person than we would normally spend when buying for everyone. I was able to give Melissa a much better gift than I otherwise would have. I think we’re planning to do something similar next year! After we were all finished opening our gifts, we turned on Finding Dory before lunch, and Brooklyn, Carter, and several others watched that before we ate lunch. It was a fun morning!
So sweet!
Making shadows on the ceiling :)
I didn’t take many pictures the rest of the day, but the kids all did really well! We weren’t sure if we’d stay the whole day or not, but we ended up not leaving until about 5 PM. Savannah took a nap in Melissa’s room after lunch, and Brooklyn ended up falling asleep in my lap later in the afternoon. By evening time, they were all tired and getting cranky, but for the most part, it was a great day of hanging out with family and eating yummy food. We love Christmas, and I’m always a little sad when it’s over.
This year, our “Christmas break” was not as long as normal. The last few months have been really busy at work for Travis, especially so since the last part of December. He took off Wednesday through Friday before Christmas and was off the 26th, but had to go back to work after that. So, the rest of the week after Christmas was pretty much like a normal work week for us. I can’t complain too much though—we are really thankful he has such a great job even if it has been keeping him really busy lately.
The rest of that week, the girls and I mostly stayed at home. The girls enjoyed playing with and using their new toys and gifts from Christmas. Brooklyn had fun wearing her new smock while painting!
Mom bought this crocheted “messy bun hat” from a friend in Trussville who makes them. I was sad when I tried it on my big head and it was way too small…haha. Thankfully, Heather is going to add some more rows and hopefully it will fit after that. Big head problems! :(
Savannah was looking seriously cute wearing her new owl backpack! I love Skip Hop stuff, and I love how this backpack buckles in front so it doesn’t fall off her shoulders.
Aunt Jenn bought the girls some Skip Hop placemats too (without knowing how much I love that brand—she’s just good!). Savannah is now officially sitting at the table instead of using her high chair tray!
Looking so grown up wearing a hair bow and sitting at the table with us!
Sweet girls :)
Every day after Christmas, Brooklyn begged to do one of the Motorworks kits with us. I told her it would be something good to do with Daddy, so she started calling it the “Daddy project”. Wednesday the 28th, she and Daddy did their first project together–building an airplane!
The kit came with its own screwdriver, so Brooklyn was able to use that and really help put it together!
She was so proud when they were finished. It was adorable! :)
Savannah’s favorite gift this year was the talking Daniel Tiger and Katarina Kittycat. It didn’t take her long to figure out how to press their paws to make them talk. She carried them around all day long for several days making them talk and sing :)
What our house looks like quite often—a big tornado!
I had to work on Friday, December 30th but ended up getting to leave by lunchtime because it wasn’t too busy. When I got home, we ate lunch and went outside to play while Travis dug grass out of the mulch around the swingset (thankfully, he’s finally finished with that!). We took the opportunity to set up Brooklyn’s new soccer goal and try it out. It was so fun and made me miss my days of playing soccer growing up!
Saturday that week was New Year’s Eve and also the day that Alabama played in the College Football semi-final game against Washington. We invited the Smiths and Lovelesses over to watch it with us and had a fun afternoon. I made different kinds of soup, and the kids played while we watched the game. We enjoyed hanging out with everyone, and it was a great way to end the year! After the game ended, we ate supper, got the kids in bed, and stayed up long enough to watch the ball drop in NYC at 11 PM. We’re too old to stay up til midnight anymore! ;)
It’s hard to believe that 2017 is already here. We are looking forward to making more memories together this year as Brooklyn and Savannah continue to grow and learn new things!
