twas the night before Christmas 2018.

Is it possible to ever have too many family pictures in front of the Christmas tree?!? 

We weren't able to attend Christmas Eve service this year so I had the kids get all dressed up for church the day before Christmas Eve. Any excuse to get Carter out of athletic shorts, right?  And Lucy is never upset to wear a sparkly dress!

 Christmas Eve was spent with my family, relaxing at home, eating all the cookies and cheese and appetizers and finally letting the kids open up a few gifts.

 It was a great afternoon spent with family. The weather was beautiful and we even snuck in a family walk to play basketball with the kids. Last year at this time it was snowing so even though we didn't have another white Christmas getting outside for some fresh air felt pretty wonderful.

 After my family left the kids chose their cookies for Santa, Carter put out a big glass of water (ha!) and they laid their Santa letters down by the fireplace before bed. We cuddled up and read the Christmas Story and Twas the Night Before Christmas before tucking them in....all giddy and excited for the next morning.

 Matt and I relaxed for a while on the couch before heading to bed and....when we woke up...Santa had come!

 Well actually, that's not really the true story. We woke up to a sick kid, crawling on the ground in our bedroom, in tears about a stomachache. This then led to hours of vomiting, more tears, lots of laundry and sanitizing the entire house. No kid should ever be sick on Christmas! I felt so awful for Carter. We started a huge pot of coffee and prepared for a very interesting morning. Definitely a memorable start to Christmas 2018.