Christmas 2012: Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve may be my favorite day of all!  I was glad to be done with shopping and wrapping so I could enjoy the day with my sweet family.  We spent the day baking cookies, making fudge and peanut brittle and preparing our delicious dinner for the evening.  Adam made the BEST cabernet braised short ribs and I made some rockin brussel sprouts and garlic smashed potatoes.  I'm pretty sure we should have a show on food network...

Ever since Caroline was born, we decided that we would spend Christmas Eve and Christmas morning in our own house.  We love having family here if they want to join, but we will be home no matter what!  It works out well since we get to establish some traditions of our own.  One of my favorite traditions is going to Christmas Eve communion at Trintiy.  It's quite hard to get a decent picture of four people - two being kids so this is the best we got.  I thought the hands under their chins were cute :)

Our precious baby on her first Christmas Eve!!

Another favorite tradition is that Adam and I give each child two presents to open on Christmas Eve.  One is always Christmas pj's and the other is always a Christmas book.  I love their matching jammies!!  We write a message to each girl inside the book.  The goal is that one day (far, far from now) when they are married and have their own babies, they will have a collection of Christmas books that they can share with their kids.

A new tradition that we have started is giving the girls an ornament each year so they will have something to start with when they have their own trees (again, very far from now).  Since they became sisters in 2012, I thought a sisters ornament was appropriate!

We always pull out our china and crystal and enjoy a delicious dinner on Christmas Eve.  That may be my favorite thing!  After dinner we lay out cookies for Santa and carrots for the reindeer before sending the girls to bed.  I love our cookie plate!

Adam and I decided to open our gifts to each other that night since we knew we would be busy helping the girls with their gifts the next day (and we knew how much they each had...).  We both had a wonderful Christmas and as always were very good to each other.  Between the two of us we opened a new tv, a new iPad, lots of clothes, and a few things for the house/Adam's office.  After that we went to bed to wait for Santa :)