christmas eve

Christmas Eve growing up was always a big deal, and something that I came to look forward to more than even Christmas morning. While it was bummer to not be with our families for a holiday that is, at least for us, all about family, we had an amazing time! We were in the planning phases of coming up with a big fancy Christmas Eve dinner when our dear friends, the Jacobsens, invited us to their house. We were told we would be having the traditional Jacobsen Christmas Eve dinner followed by a short "program." She even used her fingers as quotes when she told me about it. The had also invited a couple from our ward that had been baptized just last Christmas. It has been a rough year for this couple. They have been separated for half of it and clinging to their testimonies. I visit taught the wife this summer, but when I returned from visiting family found that she had moved out of the ward, alone. Like I said, it has been a rough year. That night we drug our crew over and had a wonderful dinner. Then, Matt Jacobsen, doing his best to tailor his program to my kiddos and this older couple who are very young in the gospel read a children's book about serving at Christmas and showed a video. Even though you could tell it was past a certain 2 and 3 year olds bedtime, the spirit was there. It was the perfect beginning to Christmas. Chad and I would like to continue our families Christmas Eve tradition, but add this kind of "program." We would also like to try to open our home to someone who might need it. It was very much our honor to be there. We ended the evening on a fun note by getting ready for bed in our new jammies. Chad and I decided to make each other and the kiddos matching PJ's as our gifts this year. We have never given each other a Christmas present during our marriage, and it was fun to do something so personal. Chad did a great job on Aimee and my night gowns. And my boys looked pretty cute in the flannels that I made out of the material Chad picked out. He returned a dish to our friends that night. She just had a baby a few weeks earlier and said when she saw him at the door in his jammies, "Whoa, you can't do this to a girl who just had a baby. I just peed a little seeing you!" I'll take that as a compliment! Finally we played Santa for the very first time. It was pretty fun eating Santa's cookies and seeing our tree reflecting light off of all the wrapped gifts. We absolutely loved it all!