Christmas Eve and Morning!

Our Christmas Eve tradition is to attend Christmas Eve candlelight services at our church.  We observed the tradition again this year, although it was extremely exhausting for some of us...

Then it was home for gumbo, potato salad, and birthday cake for Jesus! Then we put on our Christmas jammies and hopped in the bed...well, the kids hopped in the bed.  The adults stayed up, laying the stockings by the chimney with care...

Putting together tents...

And torture devices...

And dragging gifts from their hiding places to under the tree...

The next morning we had quite a few nice surprises...

Four happy kiddos...

Grandpa Crane and Grandma Tonie joined us for Christmas and of course, Grandpa is always ready for a new adventure.  He can now check "ride in a side-by-side" off his bucket list...

Merry Christmas, everybody! 

 

Christmas Fun with the Guillory Gang

'Tis the season to pose with your family inside a giant ornament made of Christmas lights! 

Hanging with the Guillory Gang is always fun.  They know how to have a good time! 

Before we took in the lights, we attended the living nativity downtown...

I love this tradition, although some years we miss it! 

This year Sadie's boyfriend and our school friend got in on the family fun...

After freezing outside at the nativity and lights, we grabbed some beignets and hot chocolate at Coffee Call.  Can't get more BR than that!  
 

A Cline Family Christmas

The Cline Family Christmas Party is one of our favorite family traditions.  This year Mawmaw and Pawpaw hosted at the storage building...

The big girls really enjoyed playing with the baby girls...

Ben is too cool for school, but still tolerates us all so sweetly.  And why is there toilet paper on the counter? 

Stylish...

The family that cuddles together...

Guess no one told Selena they were taking a sibling picture! 

We played the game with treats wrapped in a giant ball of Saran Wrap.  Some people really got into it...

I'll leave you with these sweet little nuggets cuddling on the couch...

 

Christmas with the Cousins

Q: How many photos does it take to get 9 kids to look at the camera and smile at the same time? 

A: The world may never know.  We haven't gotten that to happen yet...

Throwing in their great-grandma just ups the level of difficulty...

We tried many different configurations trying to see who could next to whom and still behave...

Corinne could not stop talking...

I finally threw in the towel and just did a silly one...

I think they all at least had a good time...

Oh, and by the way, this was Christmas with the cousins...
 

My Baby Had a Baby!

When I was 11 years old I scored my first babysitting gig (at home under my mom's supervision, of course) with the Wilson family for their first baby, Tabitha Casey.  Over the next several years, I pretty much became a member of the Wilson family and Tab and I became more like sisters than anything else.  We spent long weekends together while her parents played softball tournaments, we spent summers together while her mom was at work, we went to swim team practice for Tab and t-ball practice for her little brother Zach.  We had dance parties to Carman songs (Zach still knows "Who's in the House?!"), played Mary and Joseph with towels on our heads, and ate countless cans of ravioli.  Somehow along the way we grew up and the baby I once was cuddling on my living room couch became a grown-up married lady having a baby of her own...

It was very special for me to be able to visit Tab and Brigham in the hospital.  He is just as sweet a baby as his mommy was...

I feel kind of like a grandma...

Welcome to the world, Briggs!  I have a whole house-full of people who are just going to love you!