christmas eve

On Christmas Eve EVE, we made the sugar cookies we planned to decorate the next day.  My sweet littles were so excited about the whole process and were eager to get started. They hardly needed my help, which was kind of a strange feeling.  They are growing so independent, and while that is super helpful and wonderful, it's also just different. As I watched them work, I felt grateful for traditions and that I get to do these special things with them.  They knew exactly what to do in each step, so I guess that means I have taught them well :)

My main job was to keep them (especially Brooke) from sampling too much of the dough, haha!

I just love the pure joy in her face :)

Their cookies were perfect, and then I went and ruined them all!  The kids went upstairs to watch a movie with Kevin and I stayed downstairs to make the frosting.  I checked them at 6 minutes, set the timer for one more minute, went back to making the frosting, and completely forgot about them until a burning smell began many minutes later.  Not sure what happened with the timer, but I've never done that and I felt pretty frustrated with myself.  Brooke's two full trays were totally crispy and ruined.  We still had the tray of Colby's cookies, but I knew that wouldn't be enough.  So we were back to square one!

I told Kevin that I would just start over while they watched the movie, but they all came down to help make the dough and then we put it in the fridge to chill for an hour.  I rolled out all the cookies once the kids were in bed, but it actually went quicker than I thought it would.  I call that a Christmas miracle :)

The next morning, we slept in and headed up to the Peacock's house for a day of celebration.  They have never hosted, so the kids were especially excited.  We started with gifts and Emery stole the show with her smiles about the Blippi doll we gave her.  

Colby loved the wakeboarding gloves he received from the Peacocks and immediately had to try them on.

The three "big" girls were all giving the same caboodle, but since they didn't know they were also receiving one, the reactions were priceless.  

Grandma and Papa spoiled us all, as usual :)

After gifts, we had a delicious brisket dinner, set up Colby's pitch back, then decorated cookies.  

The cookies weren't lacking in frosting or sprinkles, haha. 

We couldn't let the evening end without playing the chimes, but then we were eager to rush home so Santa wouldn't skip our house.  The kids thought they saw his sleigh in the sky a few times, so they were freaking out that he would beat us home! 

Once we arrived home, they quickly changed into their Christmas jammies so they could open their gifts to each other.  Colby bought Brooke a tiny pet set she wanted from the Dollar Store and Brooke made him Pokemon coloring sheets, but decided last minute that she also wanted to buy him a gift.  This is the first year I've had them use their own money, so she was frantically doing chores to earn the rest of the $8 for the turtle pet set she asked me to buy for him.  They were super into giving gifts this year and I loved their excitement about the whole thing. 

Most of the wrapping was already done earlier in the season so I could enjoy those beautiful papers and bows, but I did wrap a few last minute items. 

Everything was ready for Christmas morning!