With Christmas 2012 behind us, we ultimately decided to blog a little bit of it, before we move on to wrapping up our year of projects for you, revealing a new one, and jumping into the new year with both feet, and some bigger projects than ever, that you are welcome to follow along with us. I cannot wait to get to all of that, and hopefully you all might have some great ideas and help for us along the way. It’s going to be too much fun!
But first, our little Christmas. We try to keep the entire season quite simple and stress-free. (Not always an easy thing to do – right?). We celebrate Advent, we decorate, make some handmade gifts and shop a little, bake, drive around neighborhoods at night with cocoa to see people’s Christmas lights, and stuff like that. We also try to not get too distracted from remembering that Jesus’ birth, and what the course of His earthly life would mean for us all, is the whole purpose of our own celebrations, personally. Some years Christmas Eve and Day is more simple than others, with a little more or less gifts or family/friends around.
This year we went to Christmas Eve Mass, and had a quiet evening at home, with a little festive food spread. While we had bought the kids a few gifts, Michael and I decided not to put them out the night before. First because, one, two, or all of them tend to get up during the night to use the bathroom or get a drink of water, and I really didn’t want them to see anything. Secondly, I was kind of curious what their reaction would be. There have been Christmas’ where the only gifts they received were from extended family and friends. But this year, since this year has progressively gone quite well, and we could afford more, I actually asked them all what they might want for Christmas. That’s something I’ve never actually done. Their requests were easy enough: certain books (Olivia and the Trio), a new basketball (Shane), a Pillow Pet (JackMichael), socks, (socks?), and Patriots or Tim Tebow calendar (Alexis). So we got them those things, and a few more surprises. But when they got up in the morning, there was nothing more under the tree than there had been all week: packages that had arrived for them from other family, and a large gift bag each from a sweet family friend. Still, they were bouncing around the house all happy-chatty and excited because well . . . it was Christmas Day. And they love Christmas.
(After Mass on Christmas Eve.)
But Michael and I were pretty excited, to give them their gifts! So after breakfast and an hour or so of chilling in our pajamas, we asked the kids to go upstairs for a few minutes, until we called them. After the 4 “Why?” ‘s, and our refusal to answer, they went up, and we got everything around the tree. Despite the fact that there is a lot more to our simple Christmas than presents, that happens to be all I took photos of this year! lol. Since I do intend to get back to some major scrapbooking some day, and I take photos of the kids through their childhood for their/our own memories, I always ponder if I should bother blogging these kinds of things. But our oldest (Alexis) and husband say yes – it’s our family blog in the end, and they want these memories a part of it too. Not just all of our projects and things we do. So I put together a small collection of some of my favorite photos of them opening their gifts. Note: I am TERRIBLE with on camera flash. Ugh-hate using it. But the important thing for our family history is having these (any) family photos someday – perfect or not, they will be treasured more and more as time goes on. So I am embracing candid casual photography, to most enjoy these times with my family. There is a little description with each photo. But I’ll also say that aside from what they are sitting in, and a small gift each from us, they also got a few small things together, and one bigger item (which has not yet arrived), and will be part of another post (a major room revamp), coming soon.
If you look through the slideshow, you can use the arrows to go to the next one. Anytime you want to get out of the slideshow mode, simply click ON the photo, and it will close out.
However you and your family does Christmas, we hope it was beautiful, meaningful, peaceful, and you were surrounded by love and happiness.
Shane’s raised eyebrows cracked me up. Looks just like his dad! So glad everyone had a great Christmas!
xoxo
AK
LOL, yup, that eyebrow cracks us up, too!
Thanks for coming to check out our Christmas morning, AK. > XOXO
Lovely photos. I always have such a time dealing with the camera and holidays. I want to be present in the moment and not worrying about getting the shot, but sometimes faces are just so priceless and I wish I had them captured. I can see it was a very merry Christmas with your bunch, and I wish you all a happy new year.
I know what you mean. I used to put too much effort into getting ‘great’ shots of the kids; the pressures of a professional photographer, and all. But the truth is, I am TERRIBLE with on camera flash – and it’s often necessary. BUT, I know how important these photos will be some day. (Very important and treasured. Remember that.) So anything will be better than nothing, and I choose not to stress about perfection, or getting ‘everything’ anymore. As you can tell if you look at my angle, I never even moved from the couch with my camera, on Christmas morning! LOL
As always, thanks for coming by and chatting!! Wishing YOU a Happy New Year, too.
(I hope you entered to win that $50 Gift Card! ; )