Saturday, January 3, 2009

Christmas Post #1

I'm finally getting around to posting about all of our Christmas festivities.  I separated it into three posts, and posted them so you can read from one down to three instead of going backwards.  On Christmas Eve, we attended the service at our church.  We love it!  Patrick and I were both involved.  He sang in the choir and did a scripture reading.  I played the flute.  The service is a nice combination of readings and singing, and families and individuals get involved as well (ie a family recorder choir, vocal duet, and family of 11 singing in 4 part harmony).  It ends with a candle lighting while singing Silent Night.  Patrick's mom and grandfather came, and then his sister, her husband, and two of their kids joined us at our house later that evening to spend the night.
  
It was fun to wake up with so many people in our house excited about Christmas morning.  Adeline's version of opening this gift was to take one tiny piece of paper off at a time and carry it to the couch.  We eventually helped her to speed up the process... 

Our adorable (and ALWAYS happy) nephew, Dominick.


Our niece, Taylor, opening our gift to her.  We had backpacks made in Korea for all the kids with characters they would enjoy embroidered on them along with their names.  Taylor's had Dora the Explorer, and she was thrilled.

It was so fun to watch Adeline excited about helping to open gifts this year.  I think it is just going to keep getting better from year to year.

Scrub pants!  Just what I wanted since I haven't bought any new ones in about 9 years, and I have recently gone back to work part-time.

After Adeline opened a few gifts, she just wanted to play with her new toys and was not interested in opening more.  She loves all books...

Dominick just wanted to play with the paper...

Here is Adeline showing off all of her Christmas plunder.  She didn't know where to start.  Her favorite gift was a shopping cart from Grandma with lots of play food.  She loves to push it all around the house.

The reason you don't see pictures of the other adults opening gifts is because....they didn't.  They were gathering at Patrick's moms later that evening to open gifts.  They didn't want to haul everything to our house, and we needed to leave for more holiday fun with my family...

6 comments:

Momma Roar said...

It was fun to read each post and feel a part of your Christmas excitement!

Just Mom told me that if you youtube your flute playing, she'll youtube herself singing! ;-D

And what a wonderful tradition your familiy has to give to others!

Mrs. Fix said...

Do people think you are having twins or something?

Mrs. Fix said...

Oops -- I meant to leave that comment on the Christmas blog about your PA Christmas when you say that "contrary to popular opinion" only one of the babies is yours? And I love the shots of your nephew -- he's cute!

Anonymous said...

Looks like you had a wonderful time. I love the gift bags that you pack up for Africa. What a great idea.

Jenni S. said...

Lily did the same thing about opening gifts - one teensy tiny piece of wrapping paper at a time. I love this age, though - they can be pleased with just about anything. :)

Kristen said...

so fun to read about all your Christmas celebrations. it looks like you had many fun days with family.