Christmas Eve

I really contemplated back and forth on whether to take Christmas Eve off work or not...I am so glad I decided to take it off!  We had to do so much today and I have no idea how that would've happened had I worked all day!

We started out by heading over to my mom & Grandma's to do our gift exchange with them:

The boys and I then headed out to do a little last minute shopping.  Not for gifts...thankfully, we were done with that...but we had to pick up a few last minute items for Christmas lunch/dinner that we're hosting!  It wasn't too bad out there.  The traffic was doable, the parking spots were plentiful, the shopping aisles were full, but manageable and the check-out lines were speedy!  No complaints here at all!

We got home in time to pack up the car and head to the candlelight service at church.  This is one of my favorite Christmas traditions from when I was a kid!  Thankfully my kids seem to enjoy it too!  I just LOVE singing traditional Christmas hymns and being reminded the true reason for the season!  I hate that I get so caught up in the commercial part of it, but it's hard not too when you have kids...thankfully I have tonight to bring me back down to reality!

Josh isn't trying to not fall asleep here...I just snapped the picture mid blink!

We headed over to my best friend's house after church to have dinner and let the kids exchange gifts and just hang out!  We've done this off and on over the last 6 years and I love it!  She is like family to me more than my own family - so it's nice to spend some time there and let the kids run wild!

And lastly, but not least...our final tradition of Christmas Eve is for the boys to exchange the gifts they picked out for each other!  This year they both got each other two gifts, so due to time constraints tonight - we only let them each open one; they were fine with that!  Both went right to bed and are SO excited for Santa to come!  I am expecting an early morning tomorrow, but I can't wait myself!