Christmas 2010

Our Christmas celebration began on Thursday the 23rd and went right on through the weekend.  We are exhausted today, but it was all well worth it.  We are so blessed and thankful for our wonderful families and all the work that goes into making Christmas meaningful and memorable each and every year.

We kicked our Christmas off last Thursday at our house.  We had our family celebration.  We ate supper at Minerva's and then listened to Lauren and Jillian play Christmas carols for us on their piano.

We read the Christmas story and opened gifts.  We ended our evening by blowing out the candle on our birthday cupcakes for Jesus

Then it was off to Sioux Falls the next day for our Christmas Eve celebration with Paul and Darlene

Paul and Darlene with all of the grandkids before leaving for Christmas service at their church

Lauren wrote and directed a Christmas play for us.  It was called "Do you Know the Meaning of Christmas?" They are all so cute and did a great job!

The reading of the Christmas story from the book of Luke

Some of the highlights of our gift opening were these wonderful aprons that Darlene and her friend Molly made for the girls.  They love to bake with Grandma.  On a related note, my parents found my Grandma Clark's old recipe box and apron and gave it to me for Christmas.  It brought back many fond memories of times spent in my Grandma's kitchen helping her cook and wash dishes.  

Paul gave each of his grandsons a toy gun.  Opening gifts is already a crazy scene, but then you add 3 toy guns with sound effects and you can only imagine!  Owen has hardly put the gun down since.

Another birthday party for Jesus.  This time we had pepermint stick ice cream cake.  Yum!

The next morning it was on to Mitchell.  Jordan was home and my Grandma Lilly was there from Aberdeen.  We opened more gifts. The highlights of that gift opening would have to be the silly $6 Zhu Zhu pets.  The kids were thrilled.   Thanks Uncle Jo Jo!  It was then time to get ready for another wonderful meal.    We had prime rib the night before and ham dinner with all the fixings on Christmas day. 

 

Grandma Lilly and Jillian getting started on our Christmas puzzle.  

By the end of the day, everyone (except Grandpa Pat) had contributed to the puzzle

Success!

This picture is worth a thousand words, but I will give you the condensed version.  My grandma is a die hard republican.  So naturally she likes Kristi Noem,  However she despises Kristi's hairstyle.  She and Darlene talk about this often in a joking way.  So after our annual 5 dollar gift exchange, Darlene presented Grandma Lilly with a present.  It was "from" Kristi Noem and was a wig that resembled her hair cut.  Grandma Lilly wore it with pride and got a huge kick out of it.