Christmas Eve Recap

On the morning of Christmas Eve, my dad and Adam went ice fishing for a few hours, while Mom, Christine and I worked on getting everything ready. They returned around noon, and we sat down for our nice ham dinner at 1.

Then Christine sorted the gifts while everyone else cleaned up and I did a little Chester photoshoot. He looked so sweet in his little Christmas tie that my mom got him!

 He really wanted to "help" Christine sort the presents. Love that cute little tail!

Finally, it was time to exchange presents!!!

Chester got to go first (he is the youngest afterall) and had a blast ripping open his present.

He got an adorable MN Golden Gophers outfit!

Then it was Christine's turn. We gave Christine a few Build-a-Bear items from our trip to Boston; like a Boston t-shirt,

and adorable Green Monster slippers. We also picked up some red velvet hot chocolate mix for her,

along with a plain no-player name Twins shirt (since all her favs keep getting traded...).

We gave my mom a photobook that I made of our super fun trip to Disney last Thanksgiving.

She loved it!

And for my dad, a new pan.

Chester gave his grandparents a photo of him with Santa. He's so thoughtful!

We received many generous gifts like the Crate & Barrel table cloth I loved,

an ice bucket I was obsessed with also from C&B,

a really cute lantern from Christine,

and Adam got some fun Bass Masters Tournament stuff.

Chester had fun trying on Christine's Build-a-Bear hot dog costume,

but ultimately, all the gift opening wore him out and he climbed up on my lap for a little nap. Notice his cute new "Woof" tie!? That was another fun gift he got.

On Christmas Eve, we always get together with my mom's side of the family. On the way over to Carey and Bill's we drove through the Rotary Lights display. It was lovely. It was a lot of fun to be together and see everyone. A big THANK YOU to Carey and Bill for hosting everyone again!!!

We took the annual "boys,"

and "girls" photos.

The kids opened their gifts first. And then it was Godparent gifts.

I gave Ava some furry purple earmuffs,

 and a sparkly grey dress that I was in love with. Wish it came in my size!

We also received some nice gifts.

And finally, it was time for the adult exchange. It was our first year in the adult gift pool, and we enjoyed it. For our gifts, I gave a Trader Joe's food assortment (a few of my favs like pasta, garlic olive oil, sun dried tomatoes, etc), and Adam gave a beer variety pack. We ended up with some really pretty Waterford glasses and wine for me, and RumChata and SoCo for Adam. It was fun!