Thanksgiving and Christmas Traditions

I was right...not surprising, I know! Seriously, I was right about my Thanksgiving table being full of love. Look at my wonderful family. And all of those happy faces with lots of yummy food in front of them. We are so blessed. For family. For food. Truly, I count my blessings often.

Dinner was wonderful. Mom put the turkey in the night before and then was up bright and early on Thanksgiving morning. Everyone took a turn in the kitchen helping out with different dishes. Jimmy, the wonderful man that he is, even did all of the kitchen cleaning with me while everyone else napped, read and rested. It was such a lovely day.

Anyone that knows me knows that I have a ton of Christmas traditions in my home...some would say too many...not I! My very favorite tradition would have to be making the Christmas t-shirts with the kids. I even wrote about it for the Blade..I will post it when it has been published. Anyhow, we decided to do our t-shirts while Camden was here. It was so cute watching Cam do his first shirt. He didn't cry until the last hand print and that was mostly because he was being held in an awkward position. Check out his handiwork...

This is not the best picture of all of the children but it's the best shot of all of the shirts. I don't think there was a good one of the kids...too many different moods at once!

Another one of our traditions is that we get new pajamas every Christmas Eve. We go to church and when we come home I tell the kids to go put on their jammies so we can make cookies for Santa. They go to their rooms and when they open their drawers there is a wrapped pair of jammies for them. It's really very exciting.

However, the pajamas are always holiday themed and so they are only cool for a week or two. This year we decided to change it up so that we get them on Thanksgiving evening and that way we get more wear out of them. Also, this way Camden was able to participate! So, after much eating and playing it was time for baths and jammies. And what do you know...each child had a new pair of jammies in a Christmas bag on their dressers (Camden's were by his suitcase). It was still very exciting. The kids all stripped and had their new snowman jammies on in minutes!

Again, it was very hard to get a good picture. I do love this one very much though...it's my new screen saver. What cute little cousins!!