Monday

This year we went to Jena the day after Christmas so we stretched our celebrations for a couple of extra days.  Monday night Zac, Will, Danielle, Rylee, and Marlee all had supper and opened gifts with us at Mama and Daddy's house.

 A rifle from MawMaw and PawPaw.

 Trying to put a stocking on her foot.

While Uncle Will was in the living room teaching Annie to say "Uncle Will is my favorite uncle" on command, Zac was in the kitchen taking remote control trucks out of their packaging and putting in batteries.

At the Elders

After lunch, we packed and headed to the Elders where we opened gifts, ate supper, and spent the night.  These are ALL the pictures on my camera and I think John took them!  I've sent out a request to Fran for more pics.  Hopefully she did a better job taking pictures than I did.

 He wanted this so much!

Christmas morning

 They had very specific instructions not to even peek into the living room until we got up at 7 a.m.  We went and got them from their rooms so that we could all see what Santa brought together.

 New bike for Ben.

 Mollie Grace specifically requested that her gifts from Santa be wrapped because she likes to "tear paper."

 MaryEllen

Cinderella bike.

 Ben is excellent at posing with each of his presents.  Slippers and candy canes from his stocking.

 Ben chose this Daniel Tiger set for Annie.

 Rather than just ripping into our gifts we tried to take turns and watch either other open gifts.

 John and I each took the kids shopping for gifts for each other and for John and me.  Ben chose this cup for John.

After we opened our gifts and ate breakfast, we got ready for church.  We had the privilege of lighting the final candle on the Advent wreath at church Christmas morning.  Ben read what each candle stands for while Mollie Grace (with John's help) lit the candles.  I read the scripture and John prayed.  Annie was very excited about going to big church.  She prayed about it every night for two weeks leading up to the actual day.

Stockings

Since we've never woken up at our house on Christmas morning, Santa has never left gifts in these stockings before.  That made hanging stockings a pretty big deal this year.

 I read Twas the Night Before Christmas and John read The Grinch.

 Ben read us the Christmas story from Luke 2.

I had intended to make cookies for Santa, but ran out of time so we left him Rice Krispy Treats.  Mollie Grace was very concerned about this and also left him a letter explaining the lack of cookies.

Christmas Eve Board Games

This is the first year that we were at our house on Christmas Eve.  I asked the kids what were some things they wanted to do to make Christmas Eve special.  There answers included reading Christmas books, watching Christmas movies, and playing board games.  On the eve of Christmas Eve, the entire family piled on the couch until 11 p.m. watching The Return of the Jedi.  Since we stayed up late, we ended up sleeping away most of the morning of Christmas Eve.  At 5 p.m. we attended the Christmas Eve communion service at our church.  Afterwards we played board games -- Candyland, Chutes and Ladders, and Disney Apples to Apples.

 Annie was the Candyland winner!

 I assume she landed on a ladder.

 Chutes and Ladders winner.

Annie and I won Apples to Apples!