Christmas 2013

There are very few things in this life that make me as happy as Christmas.  I'm one of those annoying people that wants to decorate and start celebrating November 1st.  It drives J crazy!  Luckily he loves me in spite of this sickness.  Well if I wasn't already a huge fan of this holiday, add a new little girl into the mix and now I'm just crazy! We celebrated all month with advent activities.  We made this cute hand print ornament at the beginning of the month.

Josh was able to take off a week this year to celebrate.  We spent a few days doing some Austin things as a family of three.  One day we hit up Gourdough's and Zilker Park to ride the train.  She loved watching all the things we passed.  Since it was December, all the decorations from the Trail of Lights were set up and we got to ride right past them.

On the 23rd, we traveled to Boerne to do Christmas with the Smith family.  No Smith family gathering is complete without games.  We spent a lot of time playing a new game called Quelf.  Blake doesn't normally wear snowboarding helmets at the dinner table ; )

On Christmas Eve, we went to lunch in town and little bit got to sport her elf hat and shoes.

That evening we went to Christmas Eve service at FBC Boerne.  One of my favorite parts of Christmas is lighting candles and signing "Silent Night."  S hung in there for most of the service by drinking a bottle and eating some puffs.  She was such a big girl sitting on the pew between Mommy and Daddy and eating her snack by herself.  Where did my baby go??

On Christmas morning, S woke up (way too early, as she does every time we travel), and she took a stroll outside with Daddy to see the sheep in her reindeer PJs.  Uncle Blake was sick starting Christmas day and through the remainder of the trip.  So we didn't wake right up and start with presents.  Eventually, we gave in and opened Samantha's about 9:00.  She didn't really know what was going on, but it was fun for her parents and grandparents to watch her. The rest of the day was spent just hanging around the house.  That evening Uncle Brad and his family came in and we got to have a Christmas round 2 followed by Christmas dinner.  The rest of the week Samantha had fun playing with her cousins, especially Grayson.  They played tag (which consisted of him running around the room and tagging her while I held her) and she laughed hysterically the whole time.  Our last night there we made a bonfire and made S'mores.  It was a perfect ending to a fun, family week of celebrating family togetherness and the birth of our Jesus Christ.