Christmas Day

We had quite the eventful day on our blessed Christmas! We have church at 8:30 in the morning and Elliot had meetings even earlier than that. I wanted to take a picture of Stella in front of the Christmas tree in her pajamas, so I woke her up at 7:30 and sat her down. I got one fuzzy picture of her sitting up, and then she just started laying down until she was resting comfortably on the floor sucking her thumb.
After a great musical sacrament meeting, we hurried home to start cooking for our Bishop's Brunch. We'd invited some people from the ward over for the morning. That was actually a really good experience for our family and we hope to be able to make this a tradition . . . and I must say, Elliot and I make a great breakfast. We gave some of them rides home, and by noon we were able to open our own Christmas presents.

Stella did amazingly well not playing with the wrapped gifts under the tree, but she did like the beads on the tree though. It was fun to try to get Stella to open her gifts. She'd open a gift and then just want to spend some time with it, not caring that she had more gifts. Elliot was so tired that he nearly needed to take a nap in the middle of gift time.

After a short nap, we headed over to Grandma and Grandpa Dibble's. We had another gift opening session with Stella's cousins. Ray couldn't get enough of opening presents, and George was so tired that he was asking Ray to open them for him. Anabelle is a great gift receiver with the gasp and thank you. Elliot and I discussed that it is so much fun to watch the kids open the gifts, but our favorite time is just being able to spend the time with family on such a special occasion.

We headed home to meet Keith and Lindsay at our house and had, yet another gift exchange. We had their name for Christmas this year and put together (what we hoped they enjoyed) a little entertainment package with movies and games and popcorn. Lindsay can't stop herself from giving Stella things, so we all got a gift from them too. It was another great time with family, even though we played a completely pointless game to end the night. I hope they come back.

We had an absolutely great holiday, complete with a whole week off of work for Elliot! We hope that your Christmas was just as enjoyable and pray for a fantastic New Year!