It's a Wonderful Life

The Christmas Season came and went so quickly this year. We had intentions of doing many more holiday related activities, but time got away from us. Gingerbread house making will be on the top of the list for next year, as it just didn't happen this year. We did do many wonderful things however, and one of our most favorite traditions is our Christmas Eve Party.

This year was our 4th Christmas in Boston; can you believe it? We really enjoy spending our holiday with our little family. The stress of traveling over the holidays has been less appealing to us in our "old age" and we have stuck around our home with our little family since our move to the big city. Since we started staying here, we have been hosting a Christmas Eve party for friends who are also staying in the area.
This year was a huge success! We had quite the aray of dietary needs with our guests; we had vegans, vegetarians, and people who needed their food gluten free. Christian pulled it off like a champion! He made a vegan and a gluten free eggplant Parmesan as well as stuffed shells (not vegan or gluten free) and it was delicious! We had quite the fun crowd this year with 5 families coming over to join in the eating festivities. We also played a killer game of Christmas Pictionary, decorated sugar cookies for Santa, sang Christmas Carols (Lisa and I did a mean rendition of "Santa Baby"), watched Berkeley crunk (see below video), and just had a good time laughing and visiting. The night went so fast, but it was memorable indeed.

That night, Santa Clause came and brought Berkeley lots of fun toys!

Christmas morning we enjoyed our traditional monkey bread and fruit, followed by hours of opening and playing with presents. McDuff LOVES opening presents; luckily he was around to show his little brother how this was done. McDuff got a variety of doggie treats, a ball and a stuffed hedge hog and was grateful that Santa Paws did not leave him out.

One of my favorite presents is my new blue tooth. I do most of my chatting with friends and family in the car, so this little gadget will be quite handy.

I purchased t his movie for Christian as it describes him to a T!
(The Absent Minded Professor)

Berkey got lots of fun toys and musical devices this year. I thought he was very clever to discover that his symbols were just the size of his electric drums and he could use them both to create "heavenly" tunes.

Just rockin' out with the Elmo guitar!

We had a wonderful Christmas! It is always bitter sweet; I love all the fun ramping up to the holidays, the day of, and then POOF, just like that it is all over!
Thanks to all who gave us such thoughtful gifts and treats!
We feel so blessed to have such a wonderful family, to be privileged to have such amazing friends here that we consider to be family as well, and to be able to celebrate the birth and life of Christ during this special time of year.