Christmas Eve!

Christmas Eve is quite honestly my very favorite day of the year. Yes, I like it even better then Christmas Day. (It's close, but Christmas Eve wins every time.) This year my sister and her family were all here staying at my moms, and we were so excited to have the whole family together. The only downfall is that the flu came with them, and a few of us weren't feeling too hot....but that didn't seem to stop the day from being loads and loads of fun.

Every year on Christmas Eve we have a 'friendly' gingerbread house decorating competition. Because my family takes competition to a whole new level, we decided this year the kids get their own little house, so they can get as creative as they want on their own...and us selfish adults can concentrate on our own houses. We put Travis and Cody in charge of hot gluing the houses (We never eat them, and they hold much better this way.)

Who knew these two would enjoy this task so much? Seriously, they spent like 2 hours cutting the perfect square, and adding little extras to each house. They are such geeks. But we love them.While waiting for the prime rib to cook (ya, we are fancy like that. We dined on prime rib, shrimp, hot rolls, baked potatoes, and salad), the kids played a game of Christmas Bingo. How cute are they?
Then Grandma gave them each a plate with an insert to color that said 'Cookies for Santa'. They loved doing this.

Me and T. Ahhh.
After dinner we started decorating our gingerbread houses. The girls had a blast doing that. They would have spent another hour adding sugar to those houses if we would have let them.


And here is T and my masterpiece. I know, it's not great. I was told about a million times during our 'friendly' competition. If you haven't guessed yet, it's not really friendly. We get downright mean while decorating our houses. The terms 'punk ass trees', 'ugly as sin', and 'midget door' were all used. And we've decided that next year we will all have the same base, but are buying our own candy, and getting judges to come and vote for the best. There will be a trophy and everything. I can't wait! T and I shall win!

Next came presents! Can you feel the excitement?

The fam, waiting for the jammies to be opened.
And the adorable cousins. They all sure love each other.
Ellie and Enna.
Then we came home for the night. The ladies put their cookies on a plate for Santa.
And then opened gifts from each other. Adyson got a stroller from Sienna. She lost hers some time ago, and Sienna was so excited to give her a new one!
And Adyson gave Sienna a bag to color. Adyson has one that Sienna loves, so she was thrilled to get one of her own.
And hugs followed. Melting my heart completely.

Then it was off to bed for the ladies. Sienna fell fast asleep, but it took Adyson hours. And then she woke at 4:30 to see if it was time to wake up yet...it was a long night!

Up Next: Christmas!