Our Christmas Eve

This is the first year that Danny and I have had Christmas eve and morning with just us and the girls.  It was nice but we certainly missed having our parents there to share it with also.

On Christmas eve day, we went to see Santa Claus.  I can't decide if I want to make it a tradition of going to see Santa on Christmas eve or not.  We did this last year and it worked out great.  We waited for about 20-25 minutes, saw Santa and we were done.  This year, it didn't go so smoothly.  We arrived to later than I wanted to see Santa at the mall closest to us and by the time we got there (a little before 11:00 a.m.), the last person in sign had this little sign saying there were the last ones to see Santa before he took his lunch break and he wouldn't be back until 1:00 p.m.  Well, I was not going to try and entertain the children at the mall and wait two hours to see Santa.  So, we loaded up and went to another mall.  By the time we got there, it was 11:45 and the line for Santa was a mile long!

Being the sacrificing mom that I am (ha!), I stood in line while Danny too the girls for some lunch at the food court.  An hour and a half later, we get to see Santa!  Alexandra briefly sat on his lap before breaking out in a scream and Anna wanted to see him, but wasn't quite comfortable sitting on his lap and didn't even want to stand in front of him without me right there holding her hand....so we kicked Santa out of his throne chair and had our family picture taken with Santa at a safe distance away!

Aubrey told Santa she wanted a Barbie for Christmas so that's exactly what Anna told him she wanted as well.  I'm so glad my children don't have high expectations for Santa!  LOL!

After seeing Santa, we finiched up a little shopping and headed home (since our whole day was practically gone).  We decided we wouldn't go to Christmas eve services at church since we would have to take all three girls in by ourselves in big church....and have communion...and have lit candles to hold...it was too much!  That's sounds like a stressful disaster waiting to happen to me!

So we decided to have Chinese take-out for dinner and just have a relaxing night at home with the girls.  Daddy read the Christmas story and then we had Aubrey recite her story-telling version of the Christmas story, which was amazing very detailed and accurate!

We then wrote our letters for Santa...each girl had their own letter, even Alexandra!

Anna's letter.  I hope Santa can read Anna language!

We put our the Christmas cookies and milk....

Alexandra has one thing on her mind!

Anna is going to make sure that Alexandra know those cookies are for Santa!

and then the girls laid their heads down in eager anticipation of Santa coming to visit!

Cuddling with Santa Daddy before bed!