Christmas Day

We enjoyed a nice morning at home on Christmas Day, and then my mom, aunt, and grandmother came over for a visit and stayed for lunch.

Squinkies.  I told Marc I would never by them. This Christmas I ate my words so I could see my 5 year old light up with excitement. 

 

Macy got a donut maker.  She was a little shocked. 

And an electric blanket for Kayla.  Her response was "I thought I had to be older to get one of these!". Don't worry, we have rules about the temperature settings and we always check and make sure it is on low or off overnight.

Kayla and Macy wanted to give Brooke a doll like theirs.

And obviously she was thrilled!

After lunch we headed over to Grammie and Grampie's house to celebrate.  They had a big surprise for the girls.  A new dollhouse that they made.

Marc has decided that since he successfully wired our house that he can run electrical on a dollhouse.  I didn't even know they made materials for that, but the girls are excited to have lights that work, and I think Marc is secretly itching for another "home-improvement" project.  Hopefully this will satisfy the craving for a while. :)

Christmas Eve

We had our annual Christmas Eve brunch again this year. We did a lot of prep work and cooking the night before.  As we were wrapping things up I started to have another gall bladder attack.  I went to lay down while Marc finished things up.  Apparently he forgot how much the cinnamon roll dough rises.  We opened the fridge a little while later to this mess.

We had a full house this year and I absolutely loved it. I am so thankful that we have a home to open up to friends and family.

Kayla wrote a Christmas song and sang it for everyone.  Unfortunately our video recorder battery was dead and we didn't think to pull our cameras out.  We are hoping to record her singing it again soon and I will post it and the words. Such a sweet song and it brought me to tears. I love that girl and her sweet, sweet spirit.

After a little rest we headed to church for the Christmas Eve service.

And then we went to my mom's for our usual Christmas Eve gumbo. Unfortunately gall bladder attack #4 started on our way over there, so I spent the entire evening curled up on the guest bed with a heating pad. I hated to miss the festivities, but I am glad the girls had an enjoyable evening. 

Enjoying the Season

Both girls had a field trip scheduled to visit Back to Bethlehem at a local church.  Macy's class went during her dance class, so we visited with Kayla's class.  Macy has a few friends in her class that have siblings in Kayla's class so it worked out well.

Listening to the Christmas story.

The girls had Christmas concerts at school.

And we decorated gingerbread houses.  This year I purchased three pre-assembled houses for them to decorate. They loved having their own house to design the way they wanted.

And it wouldn't be a complete Christmas season if we didn't do some Christmas baking.  We decided to take some goodies to our neighbors and the girls wanted to go caroling too. They were so sweet singing "We Wish You a Merry Christmas" to all our neighbors, and I'd have to say that every house we stopped at was  thrilled to hear them.  I am so proud of them for wanting to do that, practicing the songs, and for having the courage to sing to people we have never met.

 

My Babies

Oh, how I love these girls!

Opening their Christmas pajamas and new ornament for their trees.

Cooking in the fire. Nutella sandwiches were the favorite.

Disney Wrap Up

After our day at the Magic Kingdom we headed back to the resort for dinner.  We surprised the kids and took the dinner out to the pool area to eat.  After dinner we let them splash around in the water.  They had been begging to go swimming all week, but I didn't pack swimsuits.  I didn't know the pool was heated. Oh well, they had a great time splashing around.

And then Brooke toppled over.  She loves the bath.  She loves the pool.  But she does NOT love being wet in her regular clothes.  When she fell she was not happy. 

She came over to where I was sitting with my mom and went into the sob story about being wet. It was the most pitiful thing but it was sooooo funny.  Mom and I tried so hard not to straight up laugh at her. So we took the wet shirt off and zipped her fleece jacket on her. She wanted nothing to do with the pool after that.  She just wanted to go back to the room and get her pajamas on. 

Disney Food

I think I mentioned in a previous post that we received a free dining plan when we booked our vacation.  This includes a quick service meal (walk up, place an order, and walk away with a tray of food), a table service meal (buffet or order off a menu), and a snack every day that you are there. Oh my goodness at the amount of food that includes.  We took advantage of the table service meals that can be used for character dining.  That is the only reason we ate with the characters so much.  For our group of 6 it would have cost $100-150 for each of those meals.  Unreal! I think we even left our vacation with some snacks vouchers still left on our cards.  Also, every quick service and table service meal comes with a dessert.  Now don't get me wrong, I love some desserts, but two times a day every day is a bit much.  And they were not small little things.  Some were HUGE.

At the Rainforest Cafe we opted for the volcano dessert for the group rather than 5 individual ones. Now that was some good stuff.

And I had to add in a few pictures of our resort and Nemo suite.  We really enjoyed the Art of Animation resort.  It's brand new and while we didn't get to explore too much, we were quite impressed.

A pull down bed was hidden behind that cabinet and the girls thought that was the coolest thing.

I didn't take any pictures of the resort until the morning we were headed home.  The sun was bright in the sky, so I couldn't really get any good ones of the Nemo section.  We did explore the Lion King section a little before we left.

And to use up our last meal we headed to the Grand Floridian to dine with Mary Poppins and Alice.

We all had such a wonderful vacation. I don't know when we will be going again, but I am thankful for the memories we made.  The girls were at such a great age to enjoy everything, and it's an added bonus that Brooke was completely free since she was still 2 years old. And until next time (if and whenever that might be) we have a ton of pictures to look back on and reminisce.