Christmas 2011

The holidays are always such a busy time of year but are so much fun. For my family, Christmas preparations start the day after Thanksgiving. I love to decorate the house for Christmas. It always looks so good and puts a sense of excitement all over the house. This year Jon and I put up a 10 foot fake pre-lit tree with white lights and it was beautiful. I got some good ideas for my mantel from Pinetrest and it was perfect. Even Lilly had her own stocking! We had simple decorations, not too much! Presents under the tree gradually grew and grew. I love shopping for people and wrapping. This year I bought red and white polka dotted paper with ribbon and sparkly tags. To me the wrapping is just as important as the gift because it shows that you put some time and thought into every gift.

This year it was Jon's family's year for us to be with them. This was my first year away from my family on Christmas and I must say that I did very well. Of course I missed my family but I knew that I would leaving Monday to spend a week with them, so that made things easier. Jon's brother Chris and his wife Kelly came in town on Christmas Eve to spend the weekend with us. We all met Jon's parents at church for the Christmas Eve service at 5pm and then had dinner at their house afterwards. It was a great  spending time with everyone all together. Christmas morning we all went to 10am church and then back to the Reynolds house for gifts. We spent the day opening gifts, hanging out and eating lots of great food. The day ended with Chris and Kelly coming back to our house for the night which was a blast. We loved getting to spend so much time with them. They actually live in Daphne so we were not only going to be spending the week with my family but with them too! How great is that!
We woke up bright and early Monday morning and traveled 5 hours down to Daphne. When we got there my mom had made shrimp and okra gumbo (which is my favorite) for lunch. We had Christmas with them that afternoon and ate some amazing steaks that night. The week was full of great food, hunting (jon killing a doe or two), catching up with family, hanging out with Chris and Kelly, a trip to Louisiana to see the cousins and a fabulous New Years Eve night. The holiday could not have been better. We were so blessed to have such a long time off work and to be with family. I hope to have many more just like this one!