The Countdown to Christmas

Each year I swear that I'm NOT going to make Christmas goodie plates for our friends. I have always hated baking but David insists it's something we need to do and that he'll help me so I give in. And then I get buried under massive amounts of cookie making and getting everything done in time that the overwhelming stress of it all pushes me over the edge! And yet, once again, I found myself on Christmas Eve this year scrambling to get goodie plates completed.  However, this time around I roped the kids into helping me with some of the work which they were happy to do.
Yummy peanut brittle!

Let the frosting begin!

My little frosters hard at work! I love the look of concentration on their faces!

They did a great job! And we even got Noah to not lick the knife this year between frostings, ha ha!

We had our wonderful traditional Christmas Eve dinner: filet mignon, Caesar salad, cream corn, and plenty of Martinellis.

I found these miniature bottles of Martinellis at BJs this year and knew that the kids would get a kick out of having their own bottle.

Our Christmas Eve festivities included singing lots of carols...

a meltdown from Noah (I asked him to read a snowman Christmas book which he refused to do but then started bawling when Savannah started to read it...gotta love it!)...

reading several Christmas books and the scriptures, including prophesies by Isaiah, the Book of Mormon account, and Luke 2...

and listening to Savannah play her violin. Absolutely beautiful!

It was then time for Christmas Eve jammies! Noah's mood definitely improved when it was time to open gifts.

We love Christmas!!!

After watching Miracle on 34th Street, which none of us had ever seen and all of us liked, the boys headed outside to sprinkle some reindeer food on the front lawn.

One last cute Christmas picture...

and some cookies and milk left by the door for Santa...

and then it was off to bed to have those visions of sugarplums!