Merry Christmas Eve!

 

Hooray!  Christmas Eve was finally upon us and that meant it was time for our annual Christmas Eve party!  The whole family looks forward to this fun time spent with our church family as we anticipate Christmas Eve church :)

 

The Christmas curls did not last that long because it was in the 70's this year for Christmas but they were cute for a little while at least.

Addison Kate could hardly wait for her friends to start arriving!

 

Luke Michael is getting so grown up!

 

Amelia Grace was my child that made me promise we would have our Christmas Eve party even during our remodel.  

So we did!  It is just too fun of a tradition to skip a year.

 

All set for our 80 guests to arrive!  Merry Christmas!

 

Nell and I prepared for the party in record time this year.  Pros, that is what we are...Ha!

 

The Boskovich kids and Driggers kids.  Too cute for words.  And all getting much too old I might add.  

 

The most important tradition-remembering the whole reason we celebrate...our Savior's birth!

 

Grandpa Steve and Mimi.

 

And then the chaos began!  Everyone started arriving!

 

Sarah and Addison Kate friends since birth.  Love.

 

Friends enjoying soup and chili.  With the air conditioning on at full blast of course.

 

Only picture I could get of Luke during the party.  He was a full on sweaty, muddy mess by the end of the party.  But this is what all these boys look forward to every year.  Oh what fun!

 

We always gather all the kids to sing Happy Birthday to Jesus before we enjoy the cake.  It is so sweet and makes me tear up every year.  

 

Amelia and Mckenzie, never too old to be excited for Christmas!  Such sweet friends and sweet girls.

 

Amelia loves on the babies as much as I do.  Little Mary Charlotte's first Christmas!

 

Merry Christmas!  We are so thankful for all of our blessings!

 

We had a quick 20 minutes to get the kiddos cleaned up before church.  And yes, it was warm enough for bare shoulders and bare feet!  Christmas in the south...gotta love it.   

 

Our church has a beautiful tradition on Christmas Eve.  To end the service, the lights are turned off and each person has a candle and we each light the candle of the person next to us until the whole church is filled with candlelight and then we sing Silent Night.  It is so special and brings tears to Stephen's and my eyes every year.  

Mckenzie and Amelia were chosen to go down the aisles and light the candles in each row.  Very proud of them, they did a great job.  

After a beautiful Christmas Eve service we came home and continued our traditions.  Don our Christmas jammies, put out cookies for Santa and treats for the reindeer and then bribe and threaten the kids to go to sleep so Santa can come!