Christmas Cookies
When I was little, our family had a tradition of getting together a couple of days before Christmas to make Christmas cookies for our Christmas Eve festivities. Since all the kids grew up, the tradition faded away but now that Jackson and Avery are with us, we have started the tradition strong again. We went to my Aunt Janice’s house Christmas Eve morning to decorate cookies. She had the dough all ready to go so we started rolling and pressing out cookies. We had a great time catching up and passing Jackson around. Once the cookies were out of the oven, we started decorating. Jackson even participated. I made quite a few cookies just for him. Next year will be so fun when we can actually do it himself. I can’t wait.
Christmas Eve
Later that evening, we went back over to Aunt Janice’s house for our Christmas Eve festivities. We had a delicious dinner and there were tons of sweets available to munch on throughout the night. We had cookies, fudge, wedding cookies, divinity and much more. It was fun to open presents while everyone chatted. Jackson got letters from Pottery Barn Kids to hang on his wall in his room courtesy of The Curry family. I am really excited to get them up and finish the nursery. And Luke got to show off his Bob Stoops autographed football! After presents, we played a game of Taboo. Playing any game with this bunch makes for quite the entertaining evening! We played boys against girls and it was very competitive. After our game, we took some family pictures. It was so nice to have everyone together (we were just missing Joshua who celebrated Christmas in LA). Also, Michael won the cookie decorating contest!
Christmas Morning
I was so excited for Jackson’s first Christmas morning. We came down the stairs at Graham's house and saw all the presents under the tree and the stocking full of surprises. We started off with our traditional breakfast of cinnamon rolls and sausage while opening our stockings. Then we moved on to the goodies under the tree. Jackson was so sweet and contently laid on his boppy and watched us until he finally took a little nap. He got a great stocking from Santa and I am very excited about his blue nap blanket for the nursery and his red cowboy boots. It was fun taking his pictures in front of the tree for his First Christmas.
Christmas Day
We left my mom’s house and headed over to Chris’ parents for dinner and presents. I was so glad all the grandparents were there. We had a lovely dinner complete with turkey, ham, garlic mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, noodles and much much more. The Bright’s always go all out for holiday dinners. After dinner we went into the living room to open presents. Since Jackson is the youngest, he got to go first!! This is the only year he gets to go first since Baby Gollahalli #3 will be the youngest next year. Jackson got a ton of great presents including an awesome Fire Truck bank, new bibles and denim diapers. He did so well being passed around while everyone opened their presents. I think Sandyha held him the longest of anyone, she is a very proud cousin!
Christmas at Grandaddy's
The day after Christmas, we headed over to my dad’s house to celebrate with the Reecher side of the family. To start, we got to enjoy my Grandmother’s homemade eggnog. It’s absolutely amazing and I look forward to it every year. Teri made a delicious lasagna for dinner and she had the table decorated so cute. We all enjoyed catching up over a home cooked meal and Grandmother sure appreciated the day off! After dinner, we opened presents. For the last 2 years, my dad has been stuffing our stockings with the most ridiculous items. This year was no different. It’s so funny to get things meant for little kids! Jackson got a bunch of webkinz animals and some great toys. Oma and Aunt Jan got him a couple of outfits too. We had a great time hanging out with everyone and Jackson was on his best behavior as usual!
A Christmas Play Date with The Smith’s
After we finished up at my dad’s house, we ran over to see Ryan, Toni and baby Dylan. It was so nice to catch up and watch Dylan play. He is 5 months older than Jackson so he was playing like crazy. It seems like there’s no way Jackson will ever be that old! Jackson slept most of the time because, well, that’s what he does best. Ryan took some pictures of him with his new camera he got for Christmas. Toni and I also exchanged ornaments and as usual I went overboard but I couldn’t help myself! The total count was 4 and we’re only supposed to do one!! They got Jackson a toy (even though we weren’t supposed to do that) so I guess we’re even!! We took pictures of the boys in their pookies (their first Christmas presents courtesy of Uncle Jared) but it was getting late and they were letting us know it was time to get moving! It was so fun for me to see the things Jackson will be doing in just a few months.
This was such a special Christmas for us and we had a wonderful time sharing it with our family and friends. We have been so blessed and look forward to the future. I can’t wait for next year when Jackson will be able to tear into his presents on his own.
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