The First Three Days of Christmas

This year our Christmas celebrations were many, but all so fun and special. We started off the week before Christmas having C, Tio, and the kids over for dinner and to exchange gifts since they were heading out of town. We had a nice dinner, opened presents, and then the kids teamed up to defeat the Evil Uncle Jon for about 20 minutes straight.

On the Friday before Christmas Aunt Lynette and Uncle Allan hosted a party for the McClarty side of the family. For a bit it sounded like there would be no party this year and Jon and I were both bummed because we love hanging out with his family so much and don't see them often enough. Luckily it ended up happening and of course Lynette and Allan went above and beyond cooking a beautiful spread, buying gifts for all of the kids, having a Birthday cake for the four December Birthdays in the family, and of course having another unforgiving year of a White Elephant gift exchange - seriously Jon stabbed me in the back and made a deal with Allan for a gift after we had plotted something different together and Pepe refused to let anyone steal his new (somewhat feminine) scarf.

On Christmas Eve we headed to Nonna and Pepe's right after lunch. The boys got Nonna all to themselves and played and read books. After a bit Aunt Di Di, Gran, and Papa arrived. Pepe made enough food to feed at least twice the amount of people, Jon, Reed, and Kieran put on a mini Christmas concert, we had Birthday pie and Christmas pie, and were spoiled by wonderful gifts. We even managed to get the boys to stand still long enough to get a few group shots taken. After a very fun afternoon and evening we headed home to make up a plate for Santa and his reindeer and get to bed so he would visit our house.