Christmas With My Family

My family seems to have a unique family tradition -- we open our gifts to one another on Christmas Eve.  THEN on Christmas Day we get our gifts from Santa!  I have learned over the past several years that this is strange and different from what a lot of people do.  This has ALWAYS been the way we did things, even when I was very small.  We go to Christmas Eve Candlelight service at church and then come home for family pictures, spirits, snacks and gift giving!
This year, J and I decided to stay the night so that we could have our Christmas Morning/Santa gifts on Christmas Day as my family has always done.
We went over to my parent's house around dinner time on Friday afternoon to eat some stew my mom made and to help bake some yummy treats, including Santa's chocolate chip cookies. J was in charge of the Santa cookies.  He did a great job!  I tried the batter and said "they taste very vanilla-y?" He re-read the instructions and realized instead of the 1 TEASPOON the recipe called for he added 1 TABLESPOON! OOPS! =) They were still really good....the dough however didn't rise properly haha.
Since it was going to be so late after church got out, we decided to do our family Christmas pictures and light seeing BEFORE church.  This was a great idea because there were a LOT of lights on at 9:30 vs midnight!
Here are some of the family pictures from before Christmas Eve Service

J and I setting up our new tripod before getting ready

My family goofing off during pictures =) typical.

Merry Married Christmas

We came home after church and changed into comfy clothes to open all the gifts under the tree =) I will have to do a gift recap on Thursday and point out my notables =) On the way home from church we stopped at our house to pick up Ruger since we were staying at my parent's that night.  He LOVED the stairs...once he figured them out haha =) We were awake until close to 3AM snacking and opening gifts!
Christmas morning we woke up and went to see what Santa brought us! For those of you curious, our Santa gifts are the 'big' gift of the year. =)

Obligatory Christmas Morning Picture =)

One of the neatest gifts I ended up with was a kit to make a paw print ornament with Ruger! It's very cool.  and there is a place on the back to write how old he was and the date!  I LOVE it!

Can you believe this big tongue fits in his head?!

He was SO patient! =)

Stay tuned tomorrow for Christmas with my In-Laws =)
What were some of your Christmas Eve Traditions this year??