Our Christmas plans for this year started with a list of yummy food to prepare for a Christmas Eve hor d’oeuvre spread and a Christmas day brunch.
Oh my do we have ambitious children who made a HUGE list of yummy food!!
I will say that I am not sure what was more fun – preparing everything or eating it all!
We have a very joyful willing crew of helpers!
And bowl lickers!!
That huge bowl made a huge batch of puppy chow!
Chad was a diligent clementine peeler!
We dipped one end of those clementines in melted chocolate.
They are SO good!
Addie made pumpkin hand pies.
And cut out cookies.
And cinnamon rolls.
And many other things, of course, of course!!
Grant worked all morning, but got home just in time to make some fruit kebobs.
Chad had the patient job of making cinnamon chips for the fruit salsa!
The oven was in high demand, if you know what I mean.
Here’s Lane taking the stems off all the mushrooms!
Grant and Blake handled all the meat!
They baked the chicken wings and made the meatballs.
We set the table for Christmas Eve dinner and then headed to church for a Christmas Eve candle light service.
It was beautiful.
So beautiful!
We sang until our hearts were over flowing, and I did so the whole time while holding Ellie Joy!
Be still my heart.
My favorite moment of our Christmas for sure.
Addie’s sweet friend from work joined us for our Christmas Eve spread and then a routy game of Guesstures.
Such a blessed evening!
Christmas morning we spent finishing up a bit of the food for our brunch, and then we had our gift exchange.
We drew names between the eight of us here at Twin Oaks way back in November for this gift exchange.
The kiddos enthusiasm for gift giving is SUPER contagious!!
We gifted Eliza a tea set that we had bought while we were in China!
SHE LOVES IT SO MUCH!
And a new chapter book for our book crazy girl!
Eliza even made a card to go with her gift for Grant.
So, so cute!!
“Guess what I gave you? I know you want a puppy, but you got something better. God loves you”
We waited very patiently, or not, for our favorites to arrive to spend the day with us and enjoy all of that food!
Brunch was delicious!
Look at this ham David and Kayla brought!
These grand babies of ours bring the most joy possible!!
After I took that photo of Blake and Ellie, River climbed up to G Pa wanting a photo too!
Briar is already changing so much!
She is so alert and smiles at us all the time!
We had a gift exchange with David, Kayla, Clyde, Ellie, River and Briar too!
We are repurposing things around these parts – like Kayla and Addie’s American Girl dolls and Grant’s Thomas the Train set!
The kiddos who received these already used things LOVED them!!
The rest of the day we just enjoyed being together.
The kiddos played, napped, and we ate another round of that huge hor d’oeuvre spread for dinner that evening!
Looking at these photos of the second greatest gifts the Lord has given us (all those beautiful children!) is taking my breath away!
We simply are not worthy.
The first and greatest gift from the Lord is of course Jesus.
God gave us Jesus as a baby, who grew up the son of a carpenter, into a man who paid the ultimate price for our salvation.
All you have to do is say “YES.”
Yes, Lord, I accept Your gift of salvation by repenting of my sins and doing my best to live for You.
All for You, Jesus!!
May the Lord receive the glory He is due!!
