Christmas Eve 2013

We stayed as close to our ivy girl for Christmas break as much as possible.  The kids loved

staying at the Grand America for Christmas and it was so nice to switch off sitting with ivy.

  

Christmas eve was spent making totally different, but still magical memories.  

The kids all got dressed in their jammies that Buddy the elf dropped off to them at the Hotel.  

They came up to see Ivy and visit in her room for a while then we went to dinner

and swimming at the Indoor pool. The Grand also had the coolest Gingerbread houses

all throughout the Hotel.    

They mostly loved jumping from Bed to Bed while watching our favorite christmas movie

"Home Alone!"  As hard as it was leaving Ivy for the night, my other kids needed me too.

She was out for that whole week, sleeping because she was intubated. Which kind 

of made it a bit easier to leave for a bit. I still struggled not having her home with us.

One of the hardest things we've ever had to go through.

We didn't make Santa cookies, but we left him some nice chocolate covered 

strawberries and sparkling cider. ha!

I adore these sweet letters... especially Hayes' {sniff sniff}

Christmas eve...

Started off with CrossFit for me {duh}.  the workout was named "Victoria" to honor the beautiful

teacher from Sandy Hook Elementary who was shot and killed but saved her whole first grade 

class by hiding them in the closets.  Such an amazing story, and how wonderful to Honor her with 

a "Hero" WOD!  These are the things i love about CrossFit!

I love starting our own family traditions for Christmas eve, especially as the kids are starting

to get older.  We decided to go sledding with the freshly new fallen snow.  So 

much fun to go sledding, even if it was a bit windy. We were just super excited to 

be having a white christmas! 

after sledding we went to the Carson's for their famous Christmas Eve feast.  

We ate Tyler's yummy shrimp and prime rib.  It was so good! 

then we decorated some Christmas cookies, where Cory and Witney got a little bit

cometitive! ha!  

right before we went to bed, the kids always open their cousins gifts from the Johnson side,

Hayes got the coolest fort making kit from his cousin Savannah so they decided to make 

a Christmas Eve fort before bed while they watched Home Alone 2 

{our favorite christmas movie} 

Christmas eve with the Taylor cousins...

Nana & Papa hosted the Christmas eve dinner and nativity at their house this year! 

we ate delicious Texas BBQ and Beans catered from "Al's bbq" in Provo.  

DELICIOUS!!

the cousins all acted out the Nativity and my little olivia was Mary this year,

 she was so excited.

then the sibling gift exhange was "tie's & pie's"  the boys 

opened up tie's through a white elephant gift exchange and the girls each took home a pie!! 

such a fun idea! 

all the cousins opened up their gifts from nana & papa that night and they 

all got pajamas! the big boys all got their own sweet BYU basketball shorts. 

thanks nana & papa for a fun night!

cousins opening their presents from the taylor cousins...

 then nana & papa's presents...

Christmas Eve with my Sisters...

We had our Christmas eve dinner tonight at my Sister Mindy's House, all my sisters minus one! We were missing you Rachel!!! Oh and my brothers were missing too. ;)
We had a Delicious Prime Rib dinner, mashed potatoes, mindy's delicious homeade rolls, and lots of other Treats!We played games, Sang Christmas Carols, and did the white elephant gift exchange for the kids. My Grandma Jacobsen came and she is turning "90" next month. She even played the piano for us while we were all singing along!
It was a fun night and now we are ready for Tomorrow!
Merry Christmas Everyone!


Oh yah...Boston wrote santa a letter tonight saying "Only Read if you are Santa" He said he has been waiting his whole life to go to the North Pole, and asked if he could go with him and he won't ask for anymore Christmas Presents! Isn't that adorable! So now what do i do??!!(besides keep the letter for life) ;)

CHRISTMAS EVE

This was the Tables for our Christmas Eve dinner that we had at our House. It was so much fun to decorate and it turned out so pretty! This is one of the Adult tables (We had 19 adults) and 10 children 4 yrs old and up. Then 4 kids in Hi Chairs!


Here is the Little kids table. The cousins who were 4 and under sat here and had so many fun things to do to keep them busy! They had a great time.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO REESE! She is my niece who is a Christmas Eve Baby! She is such a cutie, and had a Whole lot of fun opening up a WHole lot of Presents!

And here is the Pre- Teen table. They had Crossword Puzzles and many other little activities to keep them busy!
Cory made the Most DELICIOUS Prime Rib! We also had Mashed Potatoes, Gravy, Salad, Vegetable Medley, with Chrismom's Homeade Bisquits.
I am getting Hungry just thinking about all the food we ate! I loved it!