Christmas 2011 Part 2 (Christmas Eve)

This was the first Christmas since we've had children where we didn't travel either to Virginia or Germany for the holidays.  That's probably why we actually got in the spirit this year and did some decorating and discussed our childhood Christmas traditions and which ones we wanted to carry on and how we wanted to merge them.

We ended up having gifts from each other and relatives Christmas Eve, and we hung up stockings, put out cookies and milk and Santa came and left gifts to be opened Christmas Day.  Initially, we had planned to have meat fondue for dinner on Christmas Eve, but because we didn't want to rush it and also wanted to go to church, we postponed it to Christmas Day.  A good decision, I think.

Will put up both indoor and outdoor lighting and we bought an artificial Christmas tree and some more ornaments.

The day before Christmas, we assembled the tree (still a funny thought for me, not having a life tree, but we bought a nice one and I don't think we will regret that decision) and decorated it.  Will and I did the lights, then we split up the tasks ... I hung the gold stars, Will hung the breakable ornaments and Vivian hung the non-breakable ones where she could reach.  It turned out beautifully. I believe the Santa hat on top (which matches the Santa tree skirt that you can't really see beneath the presents) may just be our new standard tree topper  :)

I quickly abandoned any effort of taking even just a passable photo of both girls in front of the tree and settled for individual photos.

Our princess

I don't know why Annelee seems to be wearing a binky in every December picture ... we don't even use it that much anymore during the day.  Or so I thought ...

And then we went to church and came home and opened presents ...

Before going to bed, Vivian and Annelee put out some milk (Vivian insisted that Santa would want chocolate milk) and cookies for Santa.

To be continued ...