A Booker Christmas

It's been a busy week at the Booker household.

Sunday night we had our Christmas program at church, and both Kaden and Jesse had a part to play. They were so super adorable, and we were so proud of them. During every practice, Jesse was THE loudest bell ringer and belter of the songs, but when he got up on stage in the evening, he got a little gun shy looking out over the crowd. He didn't sing one word, but he rang his little bells, and he looked SO STINKIN' CUTE! And Kaden sang a couple of his songs with his class, as well. Such a difference from last year's program and this one. Last year, he cried during the practices, and he hid behind a friend during the evening program. This year, he marched right up on stage, caught our eyes first thing and gave us a silly grin, shoved his hands into his pockets, and sang every word! We were so proud!

I had my whole family here from Monday until yesterday. Dad came down to get his pacemaker replaced, so they stayed with us during that whole procedure. Hopefully, this new two-lead line to his heart will greatly improve his quality of life. That's what we're praying for, anyway. And then, my big bro Clay flew in from the Border Patrol Academy for a couple of days. I haven't seen him since super early on in my pregnancy, and I probably won't see him again until Ransom is over a year old, so those few hours were precious.

And NOW - onto our Booker family Christmas!!!

We always have our own little family celebration apart from the ones we do with the Grampy's and Grammy's. We really want to establish our own family traditions that the kids look forward to each year. And we like to draw it out - just doing simple things, but making it LAST.

So, last night we got pizza for supper and played Pin the Nose on the Snowman:



None of us were so great at it, but it was fun!



Then, we gave the boys a little Christmas movie and camped out on the floor together to watch it. This morning, Daddy made us a big breakfast, and then the boys opened one "together gift." It was a big wooden fire truck that they had to put together using screws and screwdrivers - things they love to do. They thought that was pretty rockin' and it took them all morning to do.

After that, we thought it would be fun to go to the dump and run out of gas and have Grampy come and rescue us. That wasn't really part of our plan for today, but you know, things happen.......

Tonight, we're going to do a fun Nativity story that's very interactive (a gift that Mom gave us for Christmas last year, and I LOVE IT. It's called "What God Wants for Christmas" - and has all these little boxes for them to open), and we're going to let them open matching dinosaur p.j.'s. Then, if I'm feeling brave and not feeling the need for much sleep tonight, we might all camp out in our bedroom together for the night. I'll let you know how that goes......

And tomorrow, we'll read the Christmas story, have another fun, big breakfast, do all the rest of our little gifts, and just lounge around in our p.j.s and play, play, play all day!

This is totally my most favorite Christmas celebration of them all. It's simple. It's fun. It's quality time. It's laid back. It's not excessive. And I love, love, love it.

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