Christmas Season

I love Christmas; I really do.  I love the trees, the decor, the lights, the spirit.  Everything.  What is less than fun is cleaning up after Christmas.  Since we put our tree up before Thanksgiving, we were ready to take the tree down earlier than normal.  We still have a few items that still need to be packed away, however.  With school gearing up to the end of the semester, it just hasn't happened.  It will soon.  But I thought the Christmas Blog Post should come first!  :-)

We were privileged to be the Advent family at the service early Christmas Eve night.  The service was really special, and we enjoyed our traditional ride around to enjoy Christmas lights on the way home.  The annual Christmas Eve luminaries in our neighborhood take my breath away every year.  Here is Will with his friend, Marc, at church:

Now for Christmas morning - here's a quick photo of the scene that Santa left before Will came downstairs:

We hope to begin a tradition of taking a picture of Will coming down the stairs every Christmas morning:

Will had SO much fun playing with his new toys and opening presents on Christmas morning.  He even called Santa (see phone photo below; this was completely his idea!) to say THANK YOU.  :-)

Meme and Pawpaw came over a little later in the morning.  They delivered an awesome present - Will's "Froggy Chair"!  Check out his expression... priceless!

Will seemed to be so overwhelmed by the gifts Santa brought him - pictured below are the gifts FOR HIM that he wasn't interested in opening all day (and night) on Christmas!  Can you believe it?!  It was as if he was saying he didn't need anything beyond what he was currently playing with!  (We finally DID get him to open these presents the night after Christmas when Memaw and Pepaw arrived.)

A little Barney-watching in his new Froggy Chair:

We went to church on Christmas morning - there was only an 11am service - and joined the handful of folks who came out to sing Christmas carols.  Will did a great job in the sanctuary and participated in Children's Time with Pastor Jan (he is on the far right):

Uncle Matt came over after Will's nap so he could open the gifts from Bernice and him.

That evening, we went to Meme and Pawpaw's house and had a fun "appetizer" Christmas dinner, a few more presents, and some Barney/coloring time with Pawpaw.