merry and bright

After a fun week at Nana & Papa's, we are back home and getting back into the swing of things. Our Christmas was filled with celebration, family, good food, gifts and laughter. We could not have asked for anything more. We arrived at Nana & Papa's on Tuesday of last week surprised by the amount of snow they had. During our stay they must have added another foot to the banks on the side of the roads - which were as tall as I was by the time we left. It was most certainly a white Christmas.

Decorating with Nana

Anna's sprinkles - very generous!

Christmas Eve was spent decorating cookies, and preparing for the celebrations to come. We attended a church service filled with Christmas carols and then gathered together to exchange gifts afterward. Anna, exhausted from playing and laughing and playing some more, had to wait until Christmas morning to open her gifts. She woke a few times in the night asking if I thought Santa had arrived.

Once she woke and determined that it was indeed "getting light out", she ran down the stairs as fast as she could to see if he had paid a visit. She was thrilled to see her stocking full, and that her cookies and kisses for Santa had been eaten and replaced with crumbs and a note.

She had many gifts to open, but after opening the first - a tube of chapstick - she was satisfied. She was content to sit and "lipstick" as she told us, and just admire her gifts in their pretty packages. It took all day to slowly work her way through all that Santa, Nana & Papa, Uncle Nate and Grandma Mer had given her. She enjoyed each gift thoroughly before moving on to the next.

Christmas morning

"Lipsticking"

Piles of presents

Leading us in song and dance

Our visit, like the Christmas season, came to an end so quickly it seemed. So much anticipation and preparation...where I suppose so much of the fun lies. But we did take time to remember and appreciate the true reason behind the season...the birth of Christ. And as we reflect back on the past year our greatest gifts have not been those wrapped up in paper but rather the time we have spent with family & friends, the memories we have made and the promise of a baby to arrive shortly. We are truly blessed.