first, you gather everyone and get them all settled in front of the camera standing on the tripod in front of the tree,

then, you set the timer to take 10 consecutive pictures and make a mad dash to join your family by the tree…

and the camera starts snapping.

you get a couple good ones…..

a couple goofy ones

and some bad ones

But even though you have a couple decent ones, momma’s still not happy, b/c she thinks she looks fat so you switch to the other side, suck it in a little  and try again (my kidney is on my right side so that’s my fat side, ok bad excuse…lets just go with “I had too much for dinner”)

much better, but Robb looks pretty unhappy…lets try again

“Grayden, sit up straight!”

uh, now you can’t see the dog, lets move him to the other side

this isn’t working!!

lets just kiss and give up!

We had our little family party on Christmas Eve.

We started out the night with the Christmas Eve service at Ridge Point and then headed home to eat dinner.

I read the Christmas Story out of Grayden’s Bible and then we opened gifts!

We started the tradition last year by giving Grayden 3 gifts to open, because baby Jesus was given 3 gifts by the wise men, we always want to be reminded of the reason we celebrate Christmas and get gifts in the first place. Plus as you’ve seen by now, Grayden was very blessed with lots of new toys from his Grandparents and Aunts and Uncles. So we went simple.

And he has plenty of toys already (this is only half of them)

(we’ve since gone through and eliminated!)

But anyways, here is our handsome boy so excited to open presents!

Robb and I got each other an Ab Glider for Christmas and Grayden got his daddy a new wallet and an new ornament for mommy!

After presents we got Grayden changed into his new pj’s and Daddy read him the Night Before Christmas, just like last year!

We had a great night but our hearts were missing our little Brenham more than ever, how we wish we could celebrate these holidays and everyday with him and his little brother as a family of 4.

We miss you more than you’ll ever know sweet boy!

At night on Christmas Day we celebrated with Robb’s family, we enjoyed a yummy meal and then got right to the presents!

Grayden had the important job of handing out the gifts to everyone!

what a lucky boy! Elmo was the definite theme of the night ;)

We decided to do my family party on the 18th to spread out some of the parties.

We went out to dinner at Kobe grill, so good!

Then we headed back to my parents house to play games and open presents!

Grayden was all into it this year, opening all his presents with only a little help and oohing and ahhing at each gift!

after presents we played Bingo

Grayden was so spoiled with all his great gifts!!