Christmas Eve

So after the Brown family pictures on Christmas Eve we headed over to Adam's parent's house to open presents with the Hock family. It was really fun to have that time with all of us before we joined the extended families and everyone else.





We had some plans to go to other families houses but then this happened:



So we just stayed at Adam's Aunt Christie's house which was close and had a great celebration with her and her husband Devin. They have such a fun house cause Christie loves to decorate so much. So especially with all her Christmas stuff out it looked really great (and they just remodeled!)






Adam and I made brownies and brought them but Adam's little brother accidently dropped them out in the snow on the way in. It pretty much became the joke of the night (but just look at the picture! How can that not look a little comical?.. or look a little like something else...)

My favorite part of the night was after dinner when we opened presents. I was not only surprised to see presents for me but the best present of them all: pajamas!! All my life everyone else's family had the tradition of opening pajamas on Christmas Eve and I always wanted that. I was so happy to get some this year! How did Aunt Christie know? The other gift was just as great-- Christie and Adam's mom put together a recipie box for us of all their family recipies. And this family is known for being really great cooks so Adam and I were really happy to get all the recipies.

It was so great to spend this holiday with everyone (even if Cody makes funny faces and the ultra-scouter Bryan scared us a little with his new tomahawk...)

After all of that we drove over to my parents' (the Browns). The entire family happened to be in town this year so we decided (even though we live here in the city) to sleep over on Christmas Eve. We have a tradition that after we say family prayers at night we all reach our hands in and give a little cheer. My parents said when we were little they'd chant, "Let's go to bed!" and because we had put our hands in and cheered for it we got more excited (like okay! I'm totally going to bed! And I'm gonna win state!) As we've gotten older the chant has changed to "We love each other." Tonight was a little touching to see every member of our family reach their hands in-- with missionaries and spouses and nephews and everyone. It is wonderful to be together.

And to all a good night!