Keeping Up With The Joneses: Chrismtas 2011: The Eve

Christmas has come and gone...in a flash of course. I'm going to put this Christmas down as one of my favorite yet. Everything was perfect and I couldn't have asked for the festivities to be any better.

We kicked off the birthday of our Savior on Christmas Eve by heading to a live nativity. We went to this nativity last year and loved it so we wanted to visit again this year. There are lots of animals to see so the kids love it. Jordyn was really into brushing each and every one of animals. My mom had to pry the brush from her so other kids could have a turn.

Sydney was into feeding the animals handfuls of grass and she also liked sweet talking the animals.

Bryce was a little stand-offish with some of the animals, but LOVED the rooster. He wanted to spend most of his time chatting the feathery guy up. At one point we walked past the manger and I said to Bryce, "Look, there's baby Jesus". He looked around confused and said, "Where's Mary?" as she wasn't standing right next to the manger. He ended up spotting her across the way talking to a group of people and was so excited to see her.

After the nativity we headed home for dinner. My mom, dad and brothers always join us on Christmas Eve for dinner. We joke and say our house is "neutral territory". Every year we have breakfast for dinner...it's our little tradition and I love it.

Everything on Christmas Eve was perfect. I had the best time hanging out with my family. Everyone was in good spirits and we ended up having a lovely little evening. I think my favorite part of the night was taking photos. Usually this turns out to be a drag, but everyone was in such a silly mood it made for some really fun pictures.

This is just one of several pictures my mom took of me trying to annoy Joey (a favorite past time of mine) while he was deep in conversation with Bryan. After about 5 of these photos he finally realized what was going on and ended up snapping at me which is basically what I was going for. Brother and sister aggravation never gets old...no matter what our ages are!

Dad is sporting some new facial hair or as Bryce says, "Pop has grass on his face". In all of my 36 years I have never seen my dad with a beard so I'm still trying to get used to it.

A watch snap-bracelet...SWEET! Thanks Pop!

This is a really great pictures of my mommy.

Sydney was more than thrilled to get a new robe.
The one she has been sporting is about 3 sizes too small for her.
Thanks Uncle Jay!

Uncle Jay's personal shopper got this at Learning Express. It's called: "My Little Sandbox" and it's a fabulous toy. I highly recommend it...they have boy and girl themed boxes.
This will be coming with us on clinic days for sure.