A Near Perfect Christmas

This Christmas has been one for the books. It was so close to perfect, I honestly couldn't have asked it to be any better. My shopping was done, D-O-N-E, DONE 2 weeks before the blessed day. Because of Voices, I had been listening to and singing Christmas songs since September and I was STILL loving hearing it all over the place. We were all sick the week BEFORE Christmas so no sickies ON Christmas. It was awesome, freaking awesome.

Our family has somewhat of an insane way of celebrating. On Christmas Eve we go to my dad's family party first, have dinner, Santa comes and we exchange gifts with everyone. Then we head over to my mom's family, where we have dinner, Santa comes and we open the "Santa" present. Then on Christmas morning, after the craziness at home, we go to my parents house, exchange gifts with my brother and sisters families. Then we head back to my grandma's (mom's mom) and exchange the rest of our gifts with that family and have lunch. Then we try our hardest to swing by dad's family again for some snacks and a lovely visit before we're finally off to Tim's family, where we exchange gifts with mom and dad, have dinner and play games. WHEW! Then as this year would have it, 2 days later we were back at Tim's family's house for the other party where the nieces and nephews exchange and the brothers/sisters exchange, we eat dinner again, play more games and have a little program. So basically, we drive a lot, eat a lot, open a lot of presents, drive some more, eat some more and the whole things starts all over again. It's joyful madness I tell you!

I was so curious about how Alyssa would do with Santa this year. Last year she freaked! This year, Santa called her name, she hopped off my lap and went cruisin' on over to him. As soon as he put his hands down to pick her up, she spun around on her little heel and ran right back to me. Not interested in the man in red, OR the present he had for her!
 I thought we would get at least one more year where Alyssa would sleep in a little. Nope, that little thing was up at 7:30! I didn't mind, though. I was SO excited for her Christmas, to see her excitement when she would actually get to open the presents that we'd been telling her not to touch for the last month. And this is what she did.
She laid on the kitchen floor for 10 minutes and wouldn't even go in the living room!
When she finally made it to her stack-o-treasures, oh the excitement. She was hilarious. Everything she opened was "Oh, mommy! Look!"
SO, very fun, very exciting Christmas. Sounds perfect right? So close! It was so close to perfection! We of COURSE had to have one minor tragedy. Christmas Eve Alyssa was running down the hall at my Grandma's (tile floor, of course) slipped and wiped out. Smacked her poor little head on the corner of the base board, in just the right spot that it cut her little head open. And just hard enough to knock the casing of the door bell off the wall. After a few moments of screaming we were able to get a good look at it. Luckily for us, my good cuz Emi is a nurse and she happened to bring her doctor friend (a cardiologist, I believe, maybe like a Dr. Burke?) The medical professionals checked her little head and said she wouldn't need stitches. Thank goodness!
Thank you Emi. Nurse and future model for Blue Moon.

I hope everyone had as wonderful a holiday season as we did. Now if anyone is STILL reading this forever long post, you can click here for some of my favorite Christmas shots.
XOXO!