Christmas is a BIG thing in this house. Not really for the children, but the whole family. It really is our favorite holiday. There’s so much to love about this time of year. Brad’s loving the cooler weather (he still wears shorts to work though, even in the pouring rain), Landon is excited for all things Santa and presents, I love the time that we all come together as a family – both near and far, and most importantly the time that we celebrate the birth of Jesus.
Though we do celebrate Thanksgiving (and love it!) it is very overshadowed with Christmas as we begin decorating the outside lights in late October. Yes, we are that crazy family that has our lights up SUPER early, but for a good reason. Brad (the programmer) has our house wired and and the lights programmed so that they dance to music. It’s pretty spectacular but takes a long time to get all set up. Go to www.HaysChristmas.com and scroll down for a bit and you can see some videos from last year (our old house). It’s on the to-do list to get new videos. It’s also a huge task that takes a lot of time, especially since we recently moved and a lot of the things that were already in place (extra outlets and Ethernet cables) had to be redone.
The day after thanksgiving we get the tree out (fake… boo for allergies) and decorate it. It’s a great time spent as a family. Landon was excited about the decorations and did a great job helping fill the tree. We still had family here from Thanksgiving so it was great to have someone else take pictures. They own Laforge Photography and did a family photo shoot while they were here for us too. I’m anxious to get the pictures back and share. If you are in the Southern California area check them out!
Landon got to put the star on the tree. That became quite the adventure. Let me just say that Landon is heavy – good thing it was Brad lifting him up that high!
Riley surprisingly had done great with leaving the tree alone. Though there was one time I caught him standing at the tree, batting at an ornament shaking his head no.
I’ve been on the ball this year (at least at one thing!) on getting Christmas presents bought. We have most of them wrapped and under the tree. Landon loves giving presents – and receiving of course – I’m excited to see what Christmas morning will be like this year.