I know you’ve all been anxiously awaiting Christmas pictures from our place! (right??)
So here you go! Enjoy a glimpse into our Christmas celebrations!
While Mommy did some last minute Christmas preparations, Gabriel played by himself! This never used to happen, but he’s starting to do it a little at a time. Love it. 🙂 He has recently discovered building block towers and knocking them down. So cute!
A new Christmas tradition we have is for our Christmas Eve. The original idea was to have an hors d’oeurves dinner… but in reality, it ended up being Tapas From Around The World. What fun! We had Greek kabobs with tzatziki sauce; Asian potstickers with soy garlic sauce; Italian meatballs with tomato sauce; cheese (from Ireland and Norway) and crackers; sangria from Spain; Scotland-inspired sauteed mushrooms and tomatoes; England-inspired toasted cheese bread… and totally American Christmas cookies for dessert. 🙂 Yummmmm!
After dinner, Gabriel needed a quick bath before getting ready for the Christmas Eve church service… and Grandmama gave him a faux-hawk! lol.
He shared Christmas cookies with Grandpapa. His favorites are Great Grandma’s jelly thumbprints.
On Christmas morning we celebrated as a family, complete with Christmas jammies! We ate cinnamon rolls for breakfast before opening stockings, lit the Advent candles (Gabriel loves them!), then read & sang & ate chocolate – and then opened the rest of our gifts. What a fun time for us! Gabriel really enjoyed his toys… but only moderately enjoyed the unwrapping part. 🙂
I don’t know what Steven was saying here… but I think it’s hilarious. 🙂
This was the toy Gabriel picked out for his Christmas gift – a super cute little tractor complete with animals and a redheaded farmer boy. 🙂 Steven also bought him a miniature acoustic guitar – but I forgot to take a picture. 🙂 I think I was using the video instead.
This was what Gabriel did during the drive over the river and through the woods (which we *actually* do, you know!) on the way to Grandmama’s house! It was his last ride in his infant car seat. *tear*
The plethora of goodness at the country house. 🙂 Look at all those stockings! I think Grandpapa may need to start building a bigger mantle.
Sorry, Mama; I know you don’t like this picture… but I love how Gabriel was mooching off of Grandpapa’s brunch plate! 🙂 Next year let’s add hash browns. I love Christmas brunch!
The younger Bennetts arrived shortly after brunch. The three kids wore their matching outfits! So much fun! But they didn’t love getting a picture taken… this was the *best* of the bunch, believe it or not. lol.
Auntie M happily squished between the cutest niece and nephew ever. 🙂
Grandmama, enjoying her double portion.
Gabriel was uncertain about his stocking… so I got to open most of the things inside. 🙂
Lovely little Hannah.
Smiley Noah loved his new ball.
Everyone wore red on Christmas – except Grandmama who wore green. 🙂
Gabriel on his new rocking/bouncing horse!
Gabriel kicking back and trying out his brand new, awesome Britax carseat! (yes, it can still face backwards for a while – no worries!)
Our traditional Christmas dinner tasted soooooo good. The best it ever has, I think. I ate WAY. TOO. MUCH. And it was delightful. 🙂
On Boxing Day we celebrated Christmas via webcam with Steven’s family. It was great to visit, open gifts, and let Gabriel warm up a bit – although he still wasn’t quite as interactive as I’d like. I think he thinks the webcam is a strange sort of video. Although I can tell he recognizes Grandma Deb, even when he doesn’t want to talk to the video himself. 🙂
The thing under blankets is a wonderful classic red wagon! Gabriel loves it!! And so do we. 🙂 I haven’t taken a picture of him with it yet, as he needs supervised while using it. I’ll get one sometime soon. 🙂
He also got fun puzzles, a latch board, this sorting board (which he loves – especially the circles and triangles), a super cute shirt… you know, all kinds of fun things every kid needs. 🙂
A friend of mine sent a box to us, and she included a gift for Gabriel that her husband made! Isn’t it a cute little duckie? Gabriel wants to do it himself, but just gets it tied up. Someday. 🙂
Here he is leaning in to kiss the duckie.
Aaaaaaand here he is kissing his horsie. That’s what he’s into these days. Kissing things. No joke.
His books (mostly pictures of cows – I’m serious!), his toys, blankie, Dilly – yup, the kid loves to kiss.
And just because I’m so proud of myself for finally doing it… I added a couple things to the nursery today. I was given these adorable framed classic Pooh pictures over a year ago (a friend picked them up at a garage sale, and I had the perfect spot on the nursery wall for them), and just nailed them up today. And then this cute little G hook has been wanting to be a coat hook for months… and it finally got put up too. 🙂 So cute!
Thus ends the picture show for today. 🙂
I love pictures and you have some great ones!! I love that you all wear red on Christmas; so festive! I like that you have coffee signs on your kitchen walls – we do too 🙂
I think I must transfer my kids to big car seats way early. Is there an actual age you’re supposed to? I have friends that don’t ever use them (their newborns go straight into rear facing regular car seats). Kara moved out of hers right before her 1st birthday and LOVES the big girl seat 🙂 We had a neighbor in CA who was a police man and he told us that you want to keep them rear facing as long as their feet aren’t really hitting the seat in front of them. Because if you get hit head on, it can break both their legs. However, he cautioned us not to move out kids to front facing too soon (he suggested waiting until 19 or 20 months) because of their neck muscles and spine. Anyway, rambling…
Cannot get over how cute those pictures are, with all 3 babies. They cannot be mistaken for anything BUT cousins. They look so much alike. Gabriel’s hook is super cute. The sign you have that reads “BABY” is the same one above Kara’s crib 🙂
Loved the post – thanks!
Hehe, our entire kitchen is coffee themed, and some of the overflow goes out into our dining area. 🙂 And as for the “Baby” sign, I got it when I was pregnant with Gabriel, and love it. They had pink and blue signs too, but I super adore having a gender-neutral nursery – in hopes of God adding different babies into the nursery eventually. 🙂 As for the three babies… maybe someday we will get a good one of them all smiling… but it may have to be when they are older and easier to bribe, lol.
Regarding car seats… our infant carseat goes up to thirty pounds, so he could probably be in it until he’s 2. But he’s getting longer, and when he’s wearing his winter coat the straps are a bit tight to buckle. So the Britax is better. 🙂 Plus we’ve been wanting a seat with good side impact, and Britax is the best. This video is really interesting, and explains some of why we keep the carseat facing rear. We’ll do it for a while longer. I’d love to do it until he’s 3, but it depends on the car somewhat too. We’ve got small cars with small doors – so it’s a little trickier (just getting him in!) than if we had a nice big SUV or something. 🙂
This is the other video I was looking for. Again about rear-facing importance and whatnot. 🙂
Your Tapas From Around The World sound so yummy! I made Asian Potstickers just over a month ago and that was interesting; I’d never made them before 🙂
I love the matching outfits on the 3 kids and they’re all so cute! Hannah and Noah really do look a lot alike for fraternal twins!
The new car seat that Gabriel has now is really nice looking; I”m sure you’ll get to enjoy it many years to come. And every kid needs a red wagon! 🙂
Thanks for sharing all the photos and Christmas day fun 🙂
~Sam
The red sweaters & hats on the babies are SOOOOOOOOOOOOO cute. Merry Christmas!