quiet christmas

our christmas week started off with an "ugly sweater christmas party". we always have too much fun with our neighborhood family.

{all the moms in our 'hood}

one of nooch's last appearances.

christmas eve was spent with daddy in the morning, grandma/grandpa schelbauer for an early dinner, and a quiet night with my kiddos at home. we opened our traditional matching pjs and threw oats & glitter on the lawn to make our house easy to spot. we left cookies for santa and our elf, with carrots for the reindeer. then we settled in to watch rudolph the red-nosed reindeer.

christmas morning is always fun, even if there is a certain someone who won't take pictures for mommy and winds up very moody. santa was very good to our kiddos this year. the big gifts were a pink tee-pee for maddie and a vw bus tent for reese. lola even got a new bed. one thing i didn't love this christmas, the "tv fire" because it was 80 degrees outside. i would love a white (or even wet) christmas...

{fun fact: jason owned this exact bus, 
color & year, while we were dating.}

this was a whole new christmas experience for madeline. as i mentioned in a previous post, she wanted to buy a present for reese. what i didn't know, was that she was secretly making gifts for jason and myself. these mustaches are charms she has been working on with her rainbow loom for weeks. and she also made us each an ornament with grandma's help. she was so excited to give her own gifts, which made christmas complete for me. she feels that joy in giving. she gets it- better to give, than receive.