Saturday, January 7, 2012

Christmas

This year we had 3 Christmas celebrations.

Celebration #1--Orem, UT-- Little Brewer Family--December 19,2011

We decided to do our own little Christmas before we headed to the Northwest.  We sang songs, read the Christmas story while playing with our 'kid nativity' and let the girls open presents. We got Merrilee a few little books and a toy Xylophone (all from a thrift store in pristine condition! Yay for deals!) Alice got a little baby ball and Candyland to share with her sister.





Christmas #2--Ridgefield, WA--Dunn Family--December 21-25, 2011

We had a great time with my parents. They took us and the girls to see Santa. In the line leading up to him, Merrilee kept talking about Santa and seemed pretty excited, but as we got closer and closer, she got more apprehensive. By the time it was her turn to sit on Santa's lap, she had the death grip on Ben and was saying "No, no, no!" Finally she couldn't take it anymore and broke down screaming. Oh well, we'll try again next year. Alice, on the other hand, LOVED Santa! We got a cute picture of Alice with Santa (not on our camera, sorry). We did get some pictures of the girls in the line leading up to the Santa experience...





We 'did' Christmas with my parents on Christmas Eve. It was nice just having only us and my parents there. 
Alice in her cute Christmas Pjs








After we opened presents and put the girls to bed, we had a nice little Christmas Eve 'program' with my parents. One of my favorite traditions! On Sunday (Christmas) we went to church with my parents and then moved over to the Brewers for the rest of the week.

Christmas Celebration #3--Vancouver, WA--Brewer Family--December 25-29

We sure had a great time with the Brewer clan! All of Ben's (5) brothers except one were there with their families! It was a full house! We had a fabulous Christmas Seafood dinner with everyone and then opened presents and had a family devotional. (Unfortunately we didn't really get any pictures of the girls in their cute Christmas outfits, so if anyone else did, please send them our way!) This is the only one we got of Merrilee!

We loved spending time with everybody! It was so great to see Merrilee and Ashlynn play together again, now that they are both older! 




It was so fun to see ALL the cousins play together! There were lots of opportunities too...While the guys went golfing, the girls and the kids stayed home and played together. While the guys went to the Blazer game, the kids slept while the girls had a fun movie night! We all went to the new Vancouver library (Which is AMAZING!) and played together...and we also went to Aaron and Hoku's and played together. I think we need to arrange for more occasions for these cute little cousins to play together more often!

Cute Leah
Alice having fun at the library
Song had her nifty camera and took some pics of the cousins at the library!
Cute Ethan

Merrilee had a BLAST at the library!
Grandpa Brewer reading to Merrilee and Malia
The week in WA went by way too fast and we already miss everyone from both sides of the family. Thanks, all,  for making our Christmas celebrations so wonderful!

P.S.- Even though there are a lot of pics on this post, we didn't get as many as we would have liked of the girls with family members, if you have any, we would be so grateful if you could send them to us!