Christmas Eve

Christmas this year, being two weeks after my mom's stroke, was obviously very different for us.  Since we live close to each other and are close to each other, both days always involved a lot of time with my parents.  My mom is now in rehab, and while she knew it was Christmas, she didn't say a whole lot about missing it, so we decided we would visit with her the Sunday before and not put a great deal of focus on the holiday around her.  We filled the holes on Christmas Eve as best we could and had lots of time with just the four of us.

We always open presents with my parents on Christmas Eve, so that was one tradition we kept even though we were not together.  My dad insisted that we let the kids open their presents.  We took lots of video and pictures to share with them.  Avery was more than willing to help Sam with his presents.  He got a dump truck with Peek-a-Blocks and a fun ball tower.  He loves to chase balls and is even happy picking them up and dropping them repeatedly.

I knew Avery was going to be so excited about her presents, especially because we hadn't talked about it or seen pictures of it in awhile.  Her face was priceless.

My parents gave her Jake's pirate ship with all the characters.  She was in heaven.

She had picked out the ship along time ago and of course is in love with the pirate show.  They also gave her a treasure chest with coins to put in.  While she played, Sam had fun dumping the blocks out of his truck.

We decided not to attend Christmas Eve service at my hometown church and instead had dinner together at home.  We had pork loin, ranch potatoes, and asparagus.  It was a "fancy" dinner in the dining room, and the only one who made a mess was Ned.

After dinner it was time for baths and bed so that we could await the arrival of Ho Ho!