Making the most of our treasured brief time back home in KC, Dad & Mom drove down to spend a couple nights with us kids and celebrate a belated family Christmas.
We were all anticipating their arrival…
We spent the afternoon with Aunt Janice and had lunch at First Watch, followed by some last minute shopping and oohing and aaahing over her shiny new kitchen.
It feels so good to be together as a family and relax, eat, talk and play games. Unfortunately it’s an occurrence that only happens once or twice a year, so I have to sit back and remind myself to cherish every fleeting minute….even if I’m getting dealt too many consecutive bad hands at Phase 10.
(Ben would probably like me to admit that I lost to him in chess….and it wasn’t even close. What happened to the good ol’ days when he didn’t even stand a chance against me?!?!)
What a wonderful way to end our ‘Christmas Eve’.
. . . . . . . .
All the kids were up early and excited for Christmas Morning 
We decided to only gift them toys this year (afterall, they’re just two big kids at heart).
these are snowslings for scooping up snowballs without getting your hands cold and wet. brilliant!
While it wasn’t quite the same as being together on December 25th, we still kept the family Christmas tradition of reading about Christ’s birth and having oranges in our stockings. No matter when or where we gather, it’ll always feel like home by having those two things constant in our celebrations for the past 27+ years.
i love my daddy
We spent the rest of the afternoon playing more games until we were all worn out.
If only we could do this every weekend…