Christmas

We have been "Christmasing" now for over a week and I'm not sure Hayes is ever going to want to return to normal life!  The boys got a ridiculous amount of stuff this year from all sorts of family.  More than any toy, they mostly enjoyed seeing family that they love so much.  

The weekend before Christmas, Mack and Mary (Papaw Bland and Memaw Mary) came into town.  Hayes was so excited to open his first Christmas gift this year!

Saturday night, we went to Opryland hotel and visited "Holly Jolly" land.  Hayes enjoyed riding the cars and trains and seeing all the sights.  Charlie had fun taking it all in as well...

Mack and Mary with the boys...

Attempting a family picture!

On Sunday, Jenny Beth flew home from NYC and we gathered at my parents house with my mom's side of the family.  The highlight was when Santa and Mrs. Claus (Hamp and Paula Morrison) came for a visit!  Although we missed Ashley and baby Henry who was sick, the boys had a great time opening gifts and singing Jingle Bells with Santa!

On Christmas Eve, my parents joined us for our churches Christmas Eve service and then we went back to our house for Chili and snacks.  We tried out our dining room table for the first time...

And let Hayes open "just one gift from mamma and daddy"...

And then Santa got to work!

Christmas morning was SO much fun!  Hayes ran down the hall and shouted "OH WOW"!!  Charlie wasn't sure what was going on, but Hayes made sure he had all of his presents...

On Christmas night, we went back to my parents house to eat leftovers and to exchange gifts...

The weekend after Christmas, Donna and Jim (Granny and Baboo) came to visit.  They loved all of their gifts and Hayes especially loved his grocery store...

And last night, we celebrated the "end of Christmas" with Chinese food and trying out the high chair for the first time!

All in all, we had a wonderful Christmas staying at home!  Derek was able to take the entire weekend off, so we enjoyed relaxing with not much to do.  It didn't snow on Christmas this year, however we got a small dusting a few days after.

Charlie was absolutely precious on his first Christmas.  He was a trooper as I jammed him into all of Hayes' old Christmas outfits from 2 years ago!  He is our Christmas angel and we are so grateful to have him with us this year.

Hayes enjoyed Christmas more than ever.  He LOVED singing all the Christmas songs especially "Jingle Bells", "Frosty the Snowman", "Holly Jolly Christmas", Silent Night" and "Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer" to name a few.  It was really important to me that he understood why we celebrate Christmas.  So last night, I asked him and he exclaimed "because it is Jesus' birthday party!"  We will try to build on this each year!

Christmas time is truly so much better with children.  Derek and I were giddy when putting out all of the Santa gifts and couldn't wait for their reaction in the morning!  We are so thankful to celebrate baby Jesus' birth and couldn't be more grateful for the two best gifts we could have ever imagined.

Merry Christmas!