The Griffin Gang: Christmas

We had a great Christmas this year! This was our first year to stay home in our OWN home this time and start our own Christmas traditions now that the kids are getting older. We started out by reading The Elf on a Shelf right after Thanksgiving, and that was a big hit. The elf goes to the North Pole every night to tell Santa how the kids have been that day and comes back in a different spot every morning when they wake up. It was so fun to see the kids wake up each morning running around the house screaming looking and finding the elf and getting so excited about it. Not sure it did a whole lot for the behavior but it was fun anyway. We did a gingerbread house like we do every year again. We did a Christmas Advent Calendar from the Friend that was a lot of fun too. And we were lucky enough to take my parents from their home this year and have them come stay with us...and my little brother (and their dogs).

But of course not everything went as well as planned. I had so much planned that week of Christmas. But Sunday night/Monday before Christmas, we all decided to get the stomach flu the same day. To have all of us throwing up together did not make getting things done very easy. Weston and Hannah came out of it pretty quick after about 12 good hours. Poor Abby threw up for a good few days along with a double ear infection, and I threw up one day and felt crappy for about the whole week. But we were all better by the time my parents got here. I disinfected my whole house and was sure we were better. But my poor parents got it the day after Christmas and went home feeling not so good. So we hope they come back again.

Joe is a perfectionist when it comes to cooking, if you don't know already, and he had the whole meal planned. His Firm's Christmas party is at Hubbell and Hudson's Viking Cooking School every year and he got last year's menu and decided we were making all of it for Christmas. We went to the cooking school a couple of weeks ago and let's just say it's not simple food you make. It is all super fancy food and probably the best food I've ever had, especially the lobster pot pies.

So we made everything homemade down to the dressing and croutons. We had Hot Crab and Brie Dip with Lemon Pepper Toast, Roasted Pumpkin Bisque with Pumpernickel Croutons, Holiday Turkey (brined and stuffed with all sorts of yumminess), Spiced Cranberry-Zinfandel Sauce, my mom's cranberry pistachio stuffing and her awesome sweet potato casserole, Green Beans with Roasted Shallot Vinaigrette, and yummy desserts my mom made. Let's just say it was a lot of cooking but for the most part I enjoyed cooking with Joe all day for a few days. And that was all supposed to be one meal, well we split it up and had the soup and dip Christmas Eve and the rest on Christmas. We'll see if we keep to that every year...

We spent New Year's in Austin and had a great time playing games and enjoying being with family. But of course I didn't even bring my camera there. So here's some pictures that we took over Christmas. I guess there are a lot of them.

The gingerbread house that lasted all of about 24 hours before it was destroyed and eaten.

Weston was really into it this year too

Christmas Eve pjs

He was so into figuring out how to open presents this year and concentrated so hard

and yes, he is super dirty, and in a onesie...don't laugh he had a sweater on earlier

and he loved them...

Emma...Preston's dog

Lucy - my parents' dog

Hannah modeling her new pjs

and Abby...

Weston

Reading Christmas stories on Christmas Eve

Weston and Papa...both look quite excited

Christmas morning....this girl was so so much fun to watch open presents, she loved everything from underwear, to a Tinkerbell sucker. I love how excited she got over the littlest things, you had to be there

checking out their stocking stash

Abby's new favorite obsession...I haven't seen her much since

And she has the best facial expressions

She got the one thing she had been asking for for the past few months....a ladybug pillow pet

And Weston really wanting to help my dad put in the new awesome faucet my parents got us for the kitchen...it was quite cute. Weston had some great facial expressions and excitement this year too, but he was fine with the first thing he opened. They got way too much stuff. But it was so much fun!