Christmas Eve

First off, a disclaimer.  Yes, I know that it is late January and I am still blogging about Christmas. 
And I am ready to move on and talk about other things. 
And I definitely know that the few people who read this blog have no desire to see ALL the pictures I've been posting from our trip. I'm really sorry, and please feel free to skip and skim.  
However, this is the only successful way I have found to document our family history, so I feel a need to make a pretty detailed record for us to print out.  I'm almost done, and then we will move on with 2012!


After our day of sledding we returned to Grandma and Grandpa's house to make dinner and start the Christmas Eve festivities.  We were making Brazilian Black Bean soup, rolls, and baked potatoes. Yum - perfect for warming us up after a cold day in the snow. 

Joseph wanted a job, so I gave him a peeler (for the first time) and set him to work on carrots.

Oh my, what a mess he made with a pile of carrot shavings. But, he certainly had fun. There wasn't much left of the carrots after they were "peeled," so it's a good thing we had some extra in the fridge!

After dinner we gathered costume pieces and planned our Christmas Eve play. Brandon, who has been the shepherd for the past many years, wasn't here to play his part. So, Dan took over that role. Bailey continued in her role as Mary, Aubrey performed an encore as the angel of the Lord, and Joseph was . . . . Joseph, of course.  And this year we had to wrap up a stuffed hedgehog to represent the baby Jesus. Grandma's toy closet was slim pickings when it came to finding a baby doll.

I asked Bailey why she looked so upset in the photo below.  She said she was busy acting out the final scripture we read in Luke 2: "And Mary kept all these things and pondered them in her heart." So she is pondering, not sulking.

After a great spiritual discussion about the meaning of Christmas, the kids opened a few gifts: pjs for everyone and two new Christmas storybooks.

 And then the kids set to work on their letters to Santa.
 

They each found a spot upstairs to set their stocking and letter to Santa and then they settled down in front of the TV downstairs for a Christmas movie marathon.  Luckily, we were all pretty worn out, so the marathon only lasted about an hour! I guess I forgot to get a picture of the three air mattresses lined up in a row - but it was pretty cute.

We were all excited to see what Santa would bring!