Merry Christmas! {2014}

This Christmas has been full of anticipation. The kids have been counting down for forever, and in the mean time we've been cooking up a nice little surprise for them.

Off to mass!

Last night after mass, we went to Peter's brother's as usual to open gifts with his side of the family. What the kids didn't know was at the same time, my family was flying into Denver as a little Christmas suprise.

My aunt, ever the gifter extraordinaire, sent matching, personalized Christmas PJs for all of us (we hid my family's until their arrival) and we tucked the kids into Ethan's room for their first "Christmas Campout" all together as a "special treat" for Christmas Eve. It was really a guise to make beds available in the other two rooms for Uncle Q and Aunt Chica; thankfully the kids ate it up and didn't suspect a thing.

Bright and early, my mom snuck up to the reading corner and waited for the kids to open the door and start looking for Baby Jesus (the first gift that we always open after wrapping him and hiding him somewhere upstairs).

The realization and reunion of grandmother and grandaughter was pretty spectacular, especially since Marie has been talking for weeks about wishng she could see Grandma again soon.

And then the rest of the family joined in the party...

Obligatory Christmas Jammies photo!

Even Samson got his own embroidered jammies--size XL.
We somehow managed to stuff him in for a
few brief seconds of entertainment...

It was fun to watch the kids jumping up and down and squealing with delight over the gift opening, but my favorite part of the gift giving were these little gems that my brother slipped into Peter and my stockings. It took about five minutes to stop laughing from the hilarity of it all. They're camoflauge-wrapped Hershey's kisses with little Army men from our wedding seven years ago. We'd scattered them on all the tables at the reception as part of the decorations; how my brother managed to salvage not one, but two--and stash them for seven years--and then remember that he had them, we will never know. (And he's not telling). He's just got a knack for that kind of stuff. Seven-year-old chocolate, anyone?

We hosted Christmas dinner with my family and Peter's parents, and had to bring up another table and use all the chairs to fit everyone...it reminded me of many Christmases growing up and made my heart happy.

Siblings...

...the rest of the family...
and Santa Baby.

It even started snowing around dinnertime so we could have a White Christmas after all.

....................

In case we missed you on our Christmas card list after my whole computer crash debacle, here's our card from this year--be sure to send your address if you'd like one next year!



Also, because I'm a total map geek who's ironically terrible at geography, and because I have way too much time on my hands, I tracked the different places our cards went to this year...it definitely shows where our families live and where the highest concentration of Army installations are across the country. I think we have a little work to do on befriending the midwest, though!

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a Good Night!