The Christmas Post (A Little Late)

Well, things are finally calming down and I can finally devote a bit of time to the blog! Yay! I figured I should go ahead and get our Christmas stuff up...ya know...before like Valentine's Day :) Well, the Christmas break was quite busy for us. We had our little family Christmas at our house on the 19th before we headed in to St. Augustine to do all our family stuff. It was fun doing somethign here at home with kids. We spend most of our holiday at our parents' houses, so we don't do much as our own family.

Here's Ava opening one of her presents. It took a little, but she eventually figured out how fun it is to rip paper :)

The house was a disaster, but everyone had fun. Lily is wearing her super hero cape in this picture. I'll have to get a picture of that up later. It' s super cute.

Well, after our family Christmas, we started packing up to head to to St. Augustine. We spent a few days down there helping with last minute Christmas stuff and just hanging out with family. One evening, we went downtown with my Mom, brother, and some of my Mom's friends to rid eon of the tour trains and listen to Christmas music. It was a lot of fun. They gave up these 3D glasses and it made all the lights (I think there were supposed to be like 2,500,000 or something of them) look like stars.

I wish this one had turned out better, but it was still so cute. It's Lily and my Mom.

Elijah (my little brother), Ava, Lily and my Mom.

Lily with her 3D glasses. Love the scrunchy face!

Ava looking very sleepy. She was so chilled while we were on the train!

We also went to the Winter Wonderland they set up at the Amphitheatre. It was neat. They had outdoor ice skating (which is impressive in Florida, even in December. They also had an Elf Village that the kids loved and several other fun little things. The girls really love the little houses in the Village, though. It was super cute.

Here's Lily in one of the Elves' beds.

Lily loved the Peppermint Forest...lots of enormous candy and Christmas lights, what's not to love?

Awwwllll...my little cuties :)

I could not for the life of me get the two of them to sit in front of the darn Christmas tree!

Ava loved the tree, though!

Well, including our Christmas at home, we had 7 total Christmas celebrations to attend. We started Christmas Eve at my Nana's house to celebrate with her, my Dad, my Dad's girlfriend, my aunt, and my cousin. It was a lot of fun except that we forgot to pack the port-a-crib for Ava. Bad move...she turned into a little monster around 3:00. Nate finally took her out for a spin in the car so she could get in a little cat nap. She was much happier after that!

Check out the awesome egg on Ava's head...learning to walk + Mimi's tiled floor = beautiful bruises on Ava's forehead (she had a matching one on the other side).

Somehow, I ended up with all these smiley pictures of Ava, even though she was truly a monster!

Ava loved the Amazing Animals Zoo my dad got her.

She love it so much, that she promptly had to climb on top of it and try to sit in it...

Christmas morning...time for Christmas #3. We stayed at my Mom's on Christmas Eve so we could celeberate with them first thing Christmas morning. It was a really nice and relaxing morning. Mom made a super yummy breakfast and we all just relaxed, listened to Christmas music, and opened presents. It was a great way to start our crazy day!

See the super adorable giraffe slippers my Mom got Ava (there are more pics of her in them below). They are so stinking cute.

Next stop was Nathan's Grandfather and his wife's house. Then, to Nathan's Granmother's. Then, to Nathan's other Grandparents...The day went relatively smoothly and it was fun to see everyone...though, I didn't take a ton of pictures...I was really tired and the chaos is hard to photograph. Nathan's immediate family (like mom, dad, brothers, sisters, and all their wives and kids) is like 21 people, so when we all travel around to visit his grandparents (who also have 5 and 6 kids who are married and have kids) it is a huge gathering...I don't handle this super well, so the holidays are a bit stressful for me :) But, the kids love it.

Check out the slippers! So awesome!

Ava and Uncle JoJo (Nathan's brother)

Not to worry, only one more...We ended the day at Nathan's parents house...I don't think I got any pictures here, but I did get a video of Ava with JoJo (she adores Nate's brother and he is awesome with her).

And, to finish things off, a sweet picture of Lily on the day after Christmas. I am so gong to start doing her hair this way more. What a cutie, if I do say so myself :)