Christmas was super fun this year!  My whole family joined us the weekend before and that's always so fun to have them here and let the cousins play with each other.

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We kept with our yearly tradition of taking all the kids to see Santa.  This was our first year with no crying kids, and honestly I kinda like the crying kids when they see Santa.

 

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Story cracks me up on this picture because she's at the stage in life where every smile looks painful.  In fact in this Santa picture I think it looks like she's going poop.  Amos wins the award for always having the best smile.  That's one of my favorite qualities about him!

 

Deacon helped me make cookies to take to the neighbors and then Cayden and Amos helped me deliver them.  I love passing out cookies, even though we all know that we have enough sugary treats over the holiday's, there is still something so nice about giving baked goods out to people!

 

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For the first Christmas Eve since we've been here Aaron didn't lead worship, and so we had the whole day to do family stuff.  We went to church, made homemade pizza's, and opened our one gift, which the kids are totally on to that it's going to be pajama's every single year.

Then Christmas morning was wonderful and the kids loved all their gifts.  We do four gifts; a want, a need, a read, and a wear.  This year was hilarious with what they all wanted.  Deacon wanted drums.  Amos wanted an apron.  Story wanted a pillow pet.  Cayden wanted a snow globe.  How different could my kids be?!?!  Everyone got what they wanted!

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Then Aaron made an amazing dinner and we hosted friends that were in town with no family.  Of course we had our “happy birthday Jesus” cake too.  Kids LOVE LOVE LOVE singing for Jesus' birthday and as you can see we just use whatever candle we can find!

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Our favorite tradition that we started last year is that we end Christmas day at the movies for an ELF quote-along at Alamo Drafthouse.  My kids love this movie and it's always a fun treat to do this each year!

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Christmas was great and I'm overwhelmed this year with God's grace towards me and the fact that on that Christmas morning it wasn't just any baby that was born, but yet it was OUR SAVIOR that was born.  Thank you Jesus!

Jamie Ivey