Our Thanksgiving and Christmas celebrations were a bit different this year. We decided not to travel and we stayed home with our new baby girl. Brent tackled cooking a turkey for the first time, it was delicious! Brent’s mom left us with YUMMY sweet potato casserole, mashed potatoes, bread, and cheesecake pumpkin pie. We were SET! We really missed being with extended family, but also knew it was best for us to stay home and care for our little, crazy family. It was fun to decorate for Christmas with the kids… although Brady broke 3 ornaments in the first half hour of getting them out, so we enjoyed our tree with white lights, ribbon, and the star this year. 
Christmas Eve we got all ready for church and read Luke 2. It’s a tradition Brent grew up doing to remember the reason we celebrate and what the ultimate gift that was given at Christmas, our Savior, Jesus. We all opened one gift before we had our friends, the Schaller’s with their new baby Jack, over for chili and a birthday cake for Jesus. We headed to our church after that to cap of the evenings festivities.
Christmas morning the kids opened the rest of their gifts; a few stocking stuffers, new clothes, a DVD for each of them, and their choice of a gift to give to people in need. Lucy chose to give clean water to a person for a year and Brady chose to feed a family for a month. Our giving was on this site: http://giftsthatreallymatter.com/browse/compassionate-evangelism. Brent set up a scavenger hunt with the nativity set the kids loved and we just enjoyed the day celebrating our Savior as a family! 
