Christmas Eve and Christmas

We had a wonderful Christmas this year. We were so lucky to have all my siblings and their families together for Christmas. Emily and Madison had a fun time playing with their cousins and were really sad when it was time for them to leave.
On Christmas Eve we did our traditional Christmas program. Each family brings something to share; a story, movie, song, or whatever they would like to share. Everyone this year did a great job and we sang a lot of Christmas songs too. After the program we eat appetizers for dinner. This year we ate some before and some after. Everyone thought that everyone else would be bringing something sweet so we all ended up bringing non-sweet items. I brought home made taquitos, but I didn't end up making them until later in the week because there was too much that had to be cooked in the oven already.
After snacks the kids got ready for bed and layed out their stockings and then went to bed. Then I started wrapping presents. I was to busy all week doing wedding stuff and snack plates that I didn't have time to wrap presents until Christmas Eve.
Christmas morning we ate pancakes for breakfast and waited for the dishes to be done before we went in to see the presents.
Every year my dad puts up a sheet so the kids can't see what Santa brought until they are asked to come in. (I think he likes to see the expression on their face.) Above is everyone waiting to go in to see what they got. Here is JJ's gift from Santa. He got some Mega Bloks. He loves them and was very upset the rest of the morning because he just wanted to play with them and didn't really care about everything else. Here is Maddie holding one of her presents and Emily opening a present. Below are some more pictures from opening presents.


After presents we spent the rest of the day relaxing and enjoying time with all our family. We ate a yummy dinner together and played Apples to Apples and Hand and Foot. I am so thankful for our Savior and I love that we have Christmas to help us remember his birth. Emily and Madison's favorite part of Christmas was watching the "Jesus Movie" as they call it. The real title is Finding Faith in Christ. They asked to watch it several times and they love to talk about Jesus all the time. Maddie is always telling me, Jesus was baptized, and Jesus Died for me, and Jesus has holes in his hands. I love that they can feel that testimony of our Savior at such a young age.