Christmas Festivities :-)

Well the christmas festivities are over for another year and I de-christmased the house today so that we no longer have to try and keep the baby away from the tree. One of my fave gifts this year was the gingerbread house pictured above that my 'heart sister' for the year from church gave me. There's not much left of it now!!

We had a couple of christmas gatherings this year. On the 22nd my older sister and her kids came over for the day and mum and my little sis and her kids joined us too. We don't see my older sister all that often because she lives over an hour away and leads a very busy life, so it's always nice when we get to have a family catch up.

We exchanged gifts after lunch and Jaden was very excited to receive a Ben 10 alien.

Bethy loved ripping the paper off!!

These are my mum's grandkids. Josh is 6, Jaden is 10, Bethany is nearly 10 months old, Abigail is 3, Arabella is 6, and Kiera is 8.

On christmas eve I hosted dinner here for my family which included my parents, my little sis and her kids (her hubby was sick), one of my auntys, and 1 of my cousins and his wife and 2 daughters as they were down from Qld for christmas. I did the traditional christmas dinner with turkey, pork and roast veggies and for dessert there was yummy christmas pudding that my mum made and chocolate bavarian for those lilke my hubby who don't like 'fruit' things (I get all the fruit mince pies, fruit cake etc in this house, yummo!!)

Mum handing out pressies from her big box full.

Abi helping Bethy open her gifts.

Brett popping the cork on some alcohol removed wine I bought which was very nice!!

Time for the feast. (That's my dad)

My cousin's wife Rebecca pulling a bon bon with her daughter Talia.

My cousins daughter Hayley, my aunty Carol and my niece Abi.

Jaden reading silly christmas jokes to Josh.

My cousin Zac and my parents.

Bethany though the hats were very funny.

And she thought the bon bons made a fabulous microphone LOL











Christmas morning we woke up to pressies :-)

Jaden was very excited to find wii Lego Indiana Jones in his stocking.

Bethy found some peek a blocks.

This is Brett's present stash (yes I spoilt them all I know). Can you tell he is game person with 2 wii games and a playstation game there?!!

This is Bethy with her pressies. The teapot sings and talks, it's so cute and she thinks it's hilarious when we sit down and pour cups of tea with her :-)

Jaden got spoilt and especially loved all the Ben 10 stuff. The knex box was a set to make a roller coaster which he's already put together and is really cool, and the pro builder set is a helicopter which is all done now too. He loves to construct things and then of course pull them apart and see what else he can make with it.

This is me with my pressies. I got a Dymocks gift card which is very exciting news for me LOL, some perfume ('lovely' by Sarah Jessica Parker), Guy Sebastion's new CD, choccie stuff, the latest star trek movie on DVD (which I knew about cause I bought that myself ), a family edition of trivial pursuit so we can all play my fave board game togther (I bought that one too), and a beautiful willow tree figurine of a mother with a baby that made me get all emotional when I opened it. My very sweet son also bought me a pressie from a market stall which was a 2nd hand video of 'the vicar of dibley' cause he knows mummy like the vicar :-) (I also got Dawn French's autobiography as my kris kringle from Brett's family and am about halfway through it already).

We had our traditional cooked ham, eggs etc for brekky then off to church. For lunch this year we were with Brett's family but we have no photos at the moment cause our memory card was full by then and we didn't have time to download stuff before we went, but his parents took plenty of pics and we'll borrow their camera and download some off it soon, so I will post one of the kids on Brett's side when I have it.

Boxing day the kids needed to rest and chill out at home. I went out for a couple of hours with my mum, sis, aunty and another aunty and uncle to visit my grandma in the nursing home for her 92nd birthday. It's the first time she hasn't been well enough to come out for christmas or her birthday and she looked so frail. My grandma helped raise me when I was little and she has been one of the biggest influences in my life in terms of my faith. It's really hard to see such an amazing, vibrant, woman of faith deteriorate into a withered, frail, person who takes a while to even remember who we are. She is hoping to go home to be with Jesus soon and as sad as that makes me I know it will also be wonderful for her to released from the body she is in now and be with her saviour and reunited with her husband and the rest of her family who are all dead.

So that's been our week. Hope you all had a really lovely christmas (for those who celebrate it)!!