Sunday, December 23: We celebrated Christmas with my dad’s side of the family, which included my Dad, my step-mom Pat, my sister Shawn, her husband Frank, their kids Francesca, Sam and Jacqueline and my brother Johnny. It was a wonderful time! I really enjoy this get together because 1) I don’t get to see my dad’s side of the family enough, and 2) it is just the right size! Some of our family gatherings over the holidays get so big, which is great in its own way, but then I don’t even feel like I can say hi to everyone let alone have a meaningful conversation with them, but the celebration at my dad’s is just the right size! Check out this great picture I got of my dad feeding Seville…isn’t that sweet! Below that are all of the other pictures from our evening together!
Monday, December 24 (Christmas Eve): We started off by spending some time at my mom and Jon’s in the afternoon, then around 4:30 p.m. we headed over to Scott’s parents for the annual Fillingham Christmas Eve Celebration! I cannot even begin to tell you how many people (and presents) are at this celebration each year! We decided that we had at least 45 people this year! We had appetizers, went to Christmas Eve service at church and then came back to open gifts…keep in mind that this year we only did gifts for kids under 12, so the picture of gifts under the tree is mainly just for kids…hard to believe, huh!! Last, but certainly not least, we put out cookies, milk (and a grape sucker...don't know why) for Santa and carrots for the reindeer!!!
Tuesday, December 25 (Christmas Day): Our normal tradition (for the past several years) goes like this: My Mom and Jon spend the night at our house and wake up with us on Christmas morning! We open gifts, play with the kids, have breakfast, and then I rush off to take a shower and get ready for the day before heading over to my dad’s for a bit, and then over to Scott’s parents. This year there was a scheduling conflict over at my dad’s, so we did not go over there on Christmas Day and thus got a few more hours at our house. I missed seeing my dad and Pat, but the extra time at home was nice. Around 2:30 p.m. we headed over to Jim and Susie’s house and celebrated Christmas with them and Scott’s brother Craig for a few hours. Around 6:00 p.m. Scott’s Aunt Donna, Uncle Kelly and their kids Grace, Foster and Blake came over, along with Scott’s grandma for Christmas dinner! The pictures below are broken into two parts 1) Christmas morning at our house, and 2) Christmas afternoon and evening at Scott’s parent’s house!
Wednesday, December 26 (the aftermath): As I have mentioned before, I am a clean freak, so I kind of go into shock ever year on the day after Christmas. There is stuff all over our house from us rushing off the day before, and then we bring home a bunch of new stuff on top of that! This year I spent most of the 26th regrouping…cleaning out old toys and making way for new ones…I felt so, so much better at the end of the day!! That night we also went out to eat with my mom and Jon because they were getting ready to go to Arizona for a week. We ate Mexican and then came back to play Guitar Hero and Big Brain Academy. It was lots of fun!
Thursday, December 27: Seville went to the doctor in the AM and we found out she had an ear infection and sore on her tongue…which explains why she hasn’t been eating well! I just had her in on December 12th, so it is amazing how quick those ear infections can develop! We ran a bunch of errands that afternoon and then that evening our really good friends Brett, Becki, Sierra and Averi came over to celebrate x-mas!! The girls had so much fun playing, and it had been too long since we were able to catch up with Becki and Brett!! We always love spending time with them and wish we could do it more often!
Friday, December 28: Hadley and I got up early (in the middle of yet ANOTHER snow storm) and took my mom and Jon to the airport. Hadley thought that was very neat!! That evening we went to the big December Birthday celebrations for Scott’s side of the family. It was up North at his Aunt Carolyn and Uncle Charlie’s house and again we had about 45 people!! There were lots of birthdays and some leftover x-mas gifts, so it felt like Christmas Eve all over again!
Saturday, December 29: We got up and headed to Scott’s Grandma Skinner’s house around 11:00 for our Christmas celebration with her. It was wonderful and actually wrapped up our Christmas celebrations for this year!! She always makes a wonderful lunch and she enjoys seeing the girls so much! There are some pictures below! Last night we decided to stay in…finally…so we all rented a movie of our choice, picked up some McDonald’s and just stayed in!! I must admit…it was very nice!!
Tomorrow we are going to have a small New Year’s Eve celebration at our house (very, very kid friendly) and then New Year’s Day is the big annual celebration that we always look forward to over at my dad’s! Lots of yummy food, poker, gambling, family and friends!
We hope you all had a wonderful holiday week like we did! Can’t wait to do it all again next year!! We are all so truly, truly blessed! However, it is so sad when it is all over, and Hadley is just devastated this year because we are done with her special calendar…she keeps asking to check her calendar every day!! Poor girl!! I guess we are going to start counting down the days to Scott’s birthday, Valentine’s Day, etc.!
1 comment:
what a week indeed!!!
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