christmas part one

2013

we had a whirlwind week!  we had visitors friday, saturday, and sunday {love to all my friends who have come over to our abode see baby olive}.  then later on sunday, we mustered up the energy to go to marina and corey’s house for a festive get together {hello…football!}.  we wanted to meet up with everyone for the holidays and not only that, carol was in town and pammy was going to be there too!  so we had to see everyone!

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[carol, pampers, and rina]

the next night, we had the wee christmas party at the werner’s.  it’s an annual party they throw every year {for decades now, actually} and it was my fifth wee christmas with them! there is a lot of good food, lots of friendly faces, and santa claus comes to the party!

baby olive was passed along to everyone at the party…she was a hit!  how can you not love a little baby?!  plus, a warm thank you to pat and pete who gave baby olive a wonderful, generous gift from pottery barn kids!   so thoughtful and kind of them!  she’s so lucky!

i love going there every year.  that’s what i love about the holidays, you get to see people you don’t always get to see and that is always wonderful!

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[christmas at the werners // they have many trees! // i love this family shot!]

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[olive and santa…santa claus was loving olive’s little feet]

christmas eve has always been the big celebration amongst the doan’s.  over the years, it has evolved from a very late night to now, an earlier evening since we have kids!

we headed over to my parent’s house early {or as early as we could}.  we ran some errands prior and then we were stuck in awful traffic on our way there.  we arrived an hour or two later than we planned {oops!} but hey, we got there safe and sound!

i scurried inside with baby olive and my parents freaked out.  they hadn’t seen baby olive in awhile and were so excited to have the little babes in their arms.  she was sound asleep in her carseat so we left her in there for awhile but my mom pretty much had the baby in her arms the entire night!

my mom insisted on feeding us so {how can you say no?!} we waited around a bit until the food was ready.  what was on the menu?  chicken soup with rice and egg rolls.  so good.  it’s so good that grace ate it!!!

right after eating, i needed to make a pit stop at target to do some last minute exchanges.  hey, if i can get out without the bebe and quickly do some stuff, i’m on it!  thuy and i went together and it turned into a much longer trip than expected.  oh well!  i got some stuff done {although the target was a wreck and it was hard to locate items} and was satisfied.

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[baking sugar cookies!]

we went home and started cooking and baking right away!  kim, huy, and thuy did the cooking and i went upstairs to do the baking.  i wanted to make sugar cookies for the kids to decorate later!

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[the pretty plaid table spread by kim}

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[place cards!]

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[it’s not christmas without poinsettias!]

once dinner was had {um, best dinner ever!  thanks kim, thuy, and huy for the delicious meal}, the kids were summoned to decorate cookies while everyone else cleaned up.  once all that was done, the gifting began!

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[thuy’s homemade cupcakes…how cute!!!]

it was so cute to see reagan, bennett, and grace open up their gifts.  they get so excited and they all absolutely made out with some stellar stuff!  once the kids were done, the adults randomly opened theirs.  we, for the past several years, have done secret santa for each other.  as we have gotten older, it just made sense.  we can buy our own stuff but it’s fun to do this just to partake in the holiday spirit!  we get to guess who was our secret santa and i nailed mine!  i knew it was my brother dan!

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[cutest cousins!  ready to open presents!]

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[christmas jammy photo!]

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[the boys]

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[grace loving her horse snow globe!]

after gifts, the kids played and played and played.  they had such a fun time!  they ate cookies and drank hot chocolate and ripped their toys apart.

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[my most favorite gifts // christmas mouse book personalized just for olive!  thank you kim and thuy…such an awesome gift for her // rifle iPhone case from dan // my birthday gift from kim and thuy – a jonathan adler bowl!]

it was a very lovely weekend and christmas eve {and it was a white one…i love it when it snows on christmas eve!}!  such a great time shared with our friends and family.  we are truly blessed and thankful for all that we have.

xoxo

1 thought on “christmas part one

  1. Pingback: december snapshots | tandem in love

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