{ christmas eve and christmas day }

It came and went so fast! How does that happen?!
We had a wonderful Christmas Eve & Christmas Day…

Started with Christmas Eve dinner at Mark & Kim’s with our (now) traditional lefse dinner. We tried to think of how long we’ve been doing the lefse dinner, but cannot remember! Yum!

The obligatory family pictures…

The Koch’s:

Grandma and Grandkids:

Kevin, Tiffany, David, Paige, Karlye, Grandma, me, Amber, Melissa, and Craig

The Cochrane-Heiders:

Kevin, Tiffany, Paige, David, Vicky, Doug, & Craig

Melissa & Craig do this thing where they describe a “scenario” and then take a picture acting out that scenario.

This one is “Ooohhh My Gaw-sh” (in the tone of Kristen Wiig on Saturday Night Live)

After dinner, we all took our full stomach’s into church for the Christmas Eve service. It’s always great to see everyone that’s come home for Christmas.

Here’s Mom & I with Libby & Kamryn in their sweet Christmas dresses!

After church, we came home for our Heider Family Gift Exchange Game. Craig & I started things with a little 4-handed piano. We rock. (It’s been so long since I played, Craig had to show me where the keys were that corresponded with the notes on the page!)

We had a fun game with lots of great gifts being passed around!
After the game was over, we all gave Grandma her gifts. Mark & Kim gave her  talking watch, which was the hit! She loves it! We went to the Tri-Cities yesterday & she would press the button to hear the time and then repeat it for us all as if we didn’t already hear it! Too funny!

After everyone left, Melissa & I opened our two Christmas Eve presents – which are always pajamas and a Christmas book.

Mom got pajamas too!

On Christmas morning, we were so relaxed – no where to go or time crunch, so we could be leisurely and enjoy the morning. We had breakfast and coffee and opened stockings first (my favorite!) – then delivered gifts to each person and took turns opening them!

Melissa had a gift of mine wrapped in this cute hounds tooth bag (a new favorite of mine!) – and inside was this super duper soft blanket! I love it – but the dogs love it even more, I think. They both snuggled in a slept in it practically all afternoon!

Mom had the biggest surprise of the morning when she opened a laptop computer! She described it later as “the most surprised I’ve been on Christmas morning since Chatty Cathy!”

We made soups for our Christmas meal and Mark, Kim, Karlye, & Amber came in around 3pm. Melissa’s favorite gift of the day was the game, “Just Dance 2” for the Wii – which she played a TON on Christmas morning – and then got everyone to play on Christmas evening. Here’s Mom & Kim cutting a rug!

Another wonderful Christmas filled with family and fun. Just sad that it’s over so fast!