Christmas Day!

On Christmas morning we left Aunt Karla's B&B early enough to get back to our church in Lawrence for Christmas Day services.  I love how pretty our church is during Christmas time.

After church, we came home and watched The Nativity Story movie.  If you've never seen it, I'd definitely recommend it!  Watching it on Christmas Day really kept the focus where it should be, on the Christ child.

Our big party for the day was at Grandma Jo and Grandpa Denny's.  Walking through the door, we were greeted by ALL of our stockings -- that's quite a collection!

Before the kids got too crazy, we took the traditional Christmas pictures.  First Grandma and Grandpa with the grandkids.  Violet is really into giving the "rocker" look for pictures these days.  I prefer to believe she's just saying "I love you" in sign language.

Next up, each family gets their turn in front of the tree.

Then Grandma passed out all of those stuffed stockings to some eager little hands.

Once the stockings were all opened, Grandma Shirley and Violet watch as the rest of us play a game Grandma Jo had planned.

In this game, we passed around a present wrapped with LOTS of tape and attempted to unwrap it with oven mitts on our hands.  The person who finally got to the inside won the gift.  This was so much harder than you'd think!

We chowed down on some of Grandma's delicious soups, and then the time came to tear into all of those beautifully-wrapped gifts under the tree!

Here are a sampling of my kiddo's favorites!  (I missed getting a picture of Oliver with his new Rip Stik!)

And here are Grandma and Grandpa with a few of their favorites, too!

Everyone checking out their new gifts!  Oliver and Ross and trying out their fitness trackers from Grandma Jo.  In fact, lots of us (including me!) got new fitness trackers at this Christmas.

The kids toasted to a GREAT Christmas!

I believe I've been given the best Christmas gift EVER in these wonderful people I get to call FAMILY!

Merry Christmas, everyone!

Christmas Eve Part 2

We left Grandma Shirley's house in Wellsville and made it to my Aunt Karla's house about the time everyone was making it home from church at 8:00.  As soon as we walked in the door, the kids were already getting gifts!  Grandma Cheryl and Aunt Karla gave all of Grandma Ruth's great-grandkids these cute bags with lots of goodies inside.  There are 26 of the youngest generation now!

Aunt Karla also had a plastic wrap ball game planned, and this one had a little different rules.  I was telling Karla that I could never plan for one of these games because I can't STAND plastic wrap!

This game also got a bit competitive, as there were a lot of kids competing for the prizes in the ball!  We decided that next time, we may want to have separate balls for the younger kids and older kids. 

Dad and Uncle Gene supervised as the kids tore into those balls.

We were all so excited to cuddle with Sweet Baby Caroline again!  She hasn't grown much in size since the lake in August, but she sure acts older.  She is just so precious!

It was also great seeing Baby Jack again.  This family sure makes some CUTE babies!

Jack's daddy, my cousin Joel, is the original Christmas Eve baby in the Deterding family.  We celebrated both of the birthday boys with just minutes to spare before their birthday turned into Jesus' birthday!

We got a good night's sleep (for a few hours anyway) and once again were treated to a yummy breakfast at Aunt Karla's Christmas B&B.

We love spending time with SO many of our family on Christmas Eve each year.  Thank you, thank you, Aunt Karla for being such a gracious hostess and allowing the "Deterding Storm" to hit annually on this day!!  We love you!

Christmas Eve Part 1

As always, we finished up celebrating Calvin's birthday with a couple of hours to spare before heading to Grandma Shirley and Grandpa Evan's house for the first Christmas Eve party of the day.  Our family gets bigger every year, and I love to see so many of us together on Christmas Eve.

We enjoyed a delicious dinner to get started.  We filled up the downstairs with plenty of adults and kids alike.  There's a table full of trouble if I've ever seen one!

Violet hung out with her BFF, cousin Jenna, and tried out the new holiday Snapchat filters.

After dinner, the kids began eyeing all of those beautifully-wrapped packages under the tree. . .

. . . but Grandma Jo and Aunt Candy had an even more fun game planned for them!  The kids were separated into two teams to play the plastic wrap ball game, and they came away with all sorts of goodies.

Of course, it got pretty competitive, and Oliver was disappointed that he just never seemed to be able to roll doubles.  The adults enjoyed watching the kids tear into the big balls of plastic wrap.

We love Grandpa Shirley and Grandpa Evan and are so thankful that they open their home to this whole crew every Christmas Eve!