Our Christmas of White

We spent Christmas Eve at my parents, as always, with all my siblings and spouses, neices and nephews (all 30 of us...not including Ben). The night began with the priveledge of Skyping with Uncle Ben in Iraq. It was fun to get to see him and wish him a Merry Christmas. He even opened his Christmas presents while we were watching. 

We continued with great food (a lot more than normal!) and presents all around. My siblings and I along with our spouses all draw names each year and then we exchange those gifts on Christmas Eve.

Papa made an awesome play kitchen for our family and my sister's along with a refridgerator to go along with the one my brother's kids have.  Marmee gave all the grandkids matching pjs again, very cute to have all the cousins matching. Here's a picture of Marmee and Papa with 14 of their 15 grandkids (to be 18 by next August).

The night then ended with the guys commencing the first (which I'm sure will happen again) Marshmallow and Spaghetti competion. They tried to make the tallest structure they could in 15 minutes with dry spaghetti and marshmallows. It was quite entertaining. :) Of course, Eli had to get in on the action.

The next day we had great plans to have our Christmas at home, go to Marmee and Papa's again, and then to go to Cullman that afternoon to celebrate with Kevin's extended family. Well, those plans were thwarted by a pretty good covering of snow all over the ground the next morning. Yes, here in good, 'ol Alabama we had a White Christmas. It was a very fun surprise and we thoroughly enjoyed just staying home and relaxing with our family the whole day.

After reading the Christmas story, opening presents, and eating breakfast, the boys went outside to play in the SNOW. Kevin (with a little help from the boys and I) made a snowman about 6 feet tall. It was a great snow for packing, so there were many snowballs thrown.

Since we didn't get up to the Mountain on Christmas day, we got to go up there the next day. They had about 6 inches (possibly more) up there. We spent the next 2 days sledding (pulled behind the 4-wheeler of course), 4-wheeling, hiking around, and doing our best to soak up every moment of this very rare occurance in our neck of the woods.

Hope your Christmas was Merry and Bright as well!