Merry Christmas #1

Wow... I'm not really sure where the last month has gone, but it's been almost that long since we started celebrating the holidays! After a long week of everyone getting the stomach flu (with the exception of me), we had our first Christmas celebration of 2008 in Minnesota.

We had a fun brunch with Santa (poor Bapa was still feeling the effects of his stomach bug, so he didn't really get his money's worth at the buffet). Santa loved Will (so much so that he started directing our "photo shoot"... "Get a picture of him looking at me") and Jack wasn't quite sure of Santa. He warmed up a little bit throughout the morning, but only to the point of asking Santa where his reindeer were- and making sure to keep his distance from Santa's lap.

After naps, we opened presents. Will got lots of help from his big brother. We all got way more gifts than we need! Jack's highlights were his new easel & art stuff and his Diego playdoh stuff. Will loves his alphabet train.

When I was growing up, we always celebrated Christmas Eve with my dad's side of the family and had a huge Swedish spread... Swedish meatballs, sausage, lefse... yum! In the past few years, however, we've started eating soups on Christmas Eve. We kept with tradition this year & had wild rice and cheesy potato soups... equally yum! Why is it that I associate tradition with food?

It was lots of fun to have my dad around, too. He is usually heading up the usher crew at Mount Olivet on Christmas Eve, so it was nice to have everyone around for the whole day. Although it was December 14th, it still felt like Christmas!