The Most Wonderful Time of the Year...

Christmas 2008 was wonderful! This is the 2nd or third year (I honestly can't remember) that we've stayed in Reno for the holidays, and I absolutely love it. We don't have to deal with long lines at airports or long drives. We can just stay home, relax and spend time with our family.

We've got some neat Christmas traditions underway and I'm sure they'll only get better and better over the years as our kids get older. First of all, the pre-Christmas season was full of the usual: decorating gingerbread houses and putting up all of our decorations, and of course trimming the tree. We totally scored on our christmas tree this year. We actually got it pretty late this year (b/c it was just a hectic time of year for us), so I was convinced we'd come home with an ugly "Charlie Brown" tree. But not so! I think this was the prettiest tree we've ever had. It was perfectly symmetrical and nice and tall. And the kids had so much fun decorating it. Every year Dallin and I exchange ornaments that are symbolic of something that happened that year. And we also give similar ornaments to our kids. So over the years we've started accumulating some really nice, sentimental ornaments, which I absolutely love.

My kids showing off their very best behavior for Santa

This year, we also lucked out with some great snow before and during Christmas. I can't remember the last time I've had a truly "white" Christmas, but this year, it was just that. The kids had fun making snowmen, we had fun sledding, and everyone had fun running through the mounds of snow behind our house. The first day it snowed, I felt like such a kid. I spent HOURS outside with the kids pulling them on the sled, trying to shovel the driveway and having snowball fights with them. It honestly was so much fun.

Jacob ready to pummel his mama with a snowball

The cutest snow bunny -- I adore my Aubrey!!

On Christmas Eve, we made cookies for Santa and his reindeer and then re-enacted the nativity. This year's program went a lot better than last year. Last year, everyone was crying throughout the whole thing. This year, there were no tears and everyone seemed to get along... even inside the manger. As you'll see by the picture below, none of my kids like to have things on their heads, so the best we could do was to lay kitchen towels on their heads to make them look more like Mary, Joseph and a shepherd.

After the nativity, we took pictures in front of the tree and let them open their one present of the evening which is always pajamas.

This post is starting to get lengthy so I will continue the rest of the christmas festivities later this week. Enjoy the pictures!