Christmas is here!

Christmas Day
On Christmas morning, it was fun to wake up at Mom and Dad's house and the boys were excited that "Santa" did come to bring stocking presents.  It's not a secret at our house that Santa is not real...but Levi is at the age where he is having trouble distinguishing reality from fantasy and seemed quite convinced that Santa did bring him presents during the night.  :)

It was a super cold morning...I think there was a high of like 6 degrees that day.  After having washed the van the day before, we were unable to get our van doors to close all the way that morning.  So we listened to beeping all the way to church and even had to stop to push the sliding door closed after it was pulled open by the wind on our drive!  I've never had that before. 

We had a delicious ham and everything to go with it for lunch on Christmas day.  Lyle and Brenda, Jim and Lavonne, and Grandma also joined us.  After we ate, mom played Christmas carols while we all sang together.  I enjoyed that.  What I didn't enjoy quite as much was the fact that my 2 boys were pestering my cousin, Nathan, and didn't want anything to do with calming down to sing.  I am glad however, that they love to play with him so much.  :)

Almost everybody played games in the afternoon.  There was an intense game of Monopoly going on in the kitchen.

And there were a couple of good games going on in the sunroom.  Dorian learned how to play Dominoes and really enjoyed that.  The boys both bounced around to the different game tables, sitting on different people's laps.  :) 

Friday: December 28
Grandma had rented the gym at the Village to have the Bolkema Christmas party.  She treated us to pizza for supper and then those who were willing and able played a game of volleyball.  I would have played if my belly wasn't the size of the volleyball.  :)  It was fun to watch the boys though!

Then we played Bingo and picked some fun gifts off of the prize table!  And we laughed a lot opening white elephant gifts.  Nathan couldn't figure out how to button up his blanket...but Levi thought it was the best gift ever.  He cuddled up next to Nathan for nearly the rest of the night!

That's a nice look Levi!  :)

Dad looked good in his new reindeer antlers.  :)

And the girls looked quite handsome in their new moustaches.  :)

It turned out to be a late night, but it was a lot of fun!!!

Saturday: December 29
Nathan needed the day to work, so I took the boys to Sheldon to enjoy another day with family.  Dave and Judy and Holli and Matt were there so it was nice to visit more with them.  Dorian and Levi especially enjoyed playing with Caleb.  In the afternoon, we took the kids to the roller skating rink!  Dorian was quite hesitant about it, but after about an hour, he was skating on his own!!!  Levi's skates were a little easier and he did great on his own as well!

Dorian and Ashley came super close to winning one of the skating games.  :)

I'm thankful for family!  Thankful for all of the new memories that we could make together this Christmas!