The countdown to Christmas.....

We started off the week before Christmas with the Hall Extended Christmas "Eve" Party.  When our kids were growing up, we held this event on Christmas Eve and always included the Nativity and other traditional things.  A number of years ago, as the grandchildren were marrying and having other families, we moved it to the Monday before Christmas.  This has worked out great and this year, we held it at Nathan and Cynthia Page's recently finished basement.  It was perfect for our gathering and we so appreciated their willingness to open their home to 35-40 relatives.  (Side note: They did most of the work themselves and I should have taken pictures of some of the amazing things they did. They would watch instructions on youtube and then go do it. They are very talented.)

Here is Scarlett with her new Nemo pjs from Great-grandma Hall-- 

Liam found a fun toy to play with--fake fruits where the halves are attached with velcro.  He loved pulling them apart and sticking them together.  (Weird angle makes the strawberry look larger than it was.)

On Tuesday, we got to play with Scarlett again while her parents went on a date to see the "Christmas Carol".  I even got to take her home and put her to bed following her bedtime routine of getting ready for bed, reading books and then holding her hand for a little while as she fell asleep. Jena took this picture of us rocking together on our rocking elephant.

Wednesday night, Jena had ANOTHER party at Wonderwood and got to sit on Santa's lap another time.

Photobombed by Maddie Davies

 A group shot of her fun friends at Wonderwood---

Thursday and Friday were filled with my internship and then trying to get things ready for the main event on Christmas Day.  I marveled while I was rushing around that I ever managed to do this with five kids at home.  It was a bit crazy this year.  Thank heavens for Amazon my best "friend"--if you don't really like shopping, doing it at the computer and searching is much more practical.  That worked great when I knew what to get but for Jena and Gary it was a bit more challenging.  It was great on Friday evening when the last of my gifts were wrapped and packed for our Christmas trip.

Whew!!!