Four Christmases | 2016 Edition

Christmas has come and gone, and it was a whirlwind as usual. We had four straight days of Christmas this year. Throw a stomach bug in there, and it made for an interesting Christmas. 
Let's recap!
Christmas Eve Eve:
We did Christmas with Adam's dad and step mom at our house. I was just getting over the stomach bug and little did I know Paige still had it. We made the most of our time together though. We ordered pizza, opened gifts, and visited. 

Huge candy cane or sledge hammer? 

 My father in law is so creative when it comes to wrapping. One year he poked a whole in duck tape, and put our money in the hole. Lol! I got the biggest kick out of the fact he added an extra zero on this hundred. 

After everyone left Ella and I made cookies for Santa. I can't even believe how big Ella is getting. 

Christmas Eve: 

I was up with Paige at 3am cleaning up puke in her bed. That poor girl just could not kick this stomach bug. After about an hour or so I had everything clean, and we were back to bed. Adam woke up that morning feeling terrible so he stayed home, and I took the girls to my parent's house by myself. Before we left Paige broke out in the mysterious rash on her back. I'm hoping next Christmas we won't have any illness, because it definitely made Christmas a lot more stressful. 

Ella and Autumn love to open gifts together. It's of course the first thing we do, because they can not wait. 

 Paige got in on the action as well. 

By the afternoon they were in their pjs and played minecraft. Ella loves to play minecraft, and she got Autumn hooked now too. 

We ate, drank, and had a fun time on Christmas eve. I always love Christmas with my family. 

Christmas Day:

Ella busted in our room at 5am so excited over the fact that Santa left her a hatcnhimal. I told her on Christmas Eve that if she wakes up when it's still dark she can come down to see what Santa left her but she had to go back to bed until the sun came up. I even told her that if she received a hatcnhimal she could take that back to bed with her. That obviously didn't happen. 

We still had to wait for Paige and daddy to get up so by the time 7:00 rolled around Ella was tired and bored from waiting. 

Paige finally got up around 7:30, and it was time to open gifts. Paige figured out the unwrapping gifts part of Christmas so she was all about it on Christmas Day. 

All I wanted for Christmas was pictures of my girls together, and they were both happy to do that for me. 

Paige learning from the best gift opener around!

It was so fun watching Ella open gifts. The looks of shock were so cute. I have a feeling this might be the last year Ella believes in Santa so I definitely soaked it up this year. 

When Ella figured out Santa brought her a hover board. 

Christmas Chaos....

I have cooked a big meal on Christmas the past two years, but it didn't happen this year. We were all pretty exhausted and ended up ordering Chinese. It was delicious! Paige threw up in her bed during nap that day and broke out in a rash. I gave her benadryl to help with the itching, and it made her extremely irritable. I won't be doing that again. It was a Christmas day to remember!

Day After Christmas:

Everyone woke up well this past Monday. It was our first normal day in a week so I was thankful for no puke finally! 

We had Christmas with Adam's mom, step dad, sister, and her boyfriend that afternoon. Before we left I wanted to get a family picture. This is the best we could get with a self timer. 

We had lunch, opened gifts, and hung out most of the day. It was unseasonably warm so it was a nice day to sit out on the porch and watch the rain. 

We had a great Christmas, but it was definitely a little stressful dealing with the sickness we had going on. We still enjoyed a lot of food, family time, and fun!