{merry and bright}

for the second year in a row we celebrated Christmas at the lake with my parents. it was a delightful weekend...a white Christmas without crazy slick roads or overly cold temperatures...snow on the ground, a frozen lake right outside the door, sleds, ice skate (or ice skaters as libbers calls them!), loved ones all around, plenty of treats, and lots of love.

the girls ages made for an extra special year of celebrating. everyone was old enough to "get it"...elizabeth and kate realizing that we are celebrating JESUS...not just presents, jillian getting the joy and excitement (and, oh my, she sure loves anything involving singing...especially Christmas carols, as we found going through our monthly advent devotionals and singing).

we were able to enjoy a candlelight Christmas eve service at my parents' church...and then after the girls received their traditional Christmas eve present (matching jammies...monkeys this year...but none of the jammie opening pics turned out well) we snuggled in to watch "A Charlie Brown Christmas" together....how special that GG (my grandma--the girls' great grandma) was even with us, as she spent the night so she could be there at the crack of dawn Christmas morning.

here are some excerpts of our Christmas...which was oh so merry and bright!

a rare family photo...sorry for the flash in the window, but its actually not bad otherwise...poor jilly was teething and battling a cold most of the weekend, hence blankie and paci being nearby! :)

the girls awaiting their Christmas eve jammie present

my jilly-babe (family doesn't she look JUST like shell in this picture...seriously!)

after the girls were tucked in bed the adults spread the bounty around the tree

jilly was the first to dig into her stocking...she was so cute, just kept looking inside and pulling things out!

she definitely figured out the unwrapping thing (and if you zoom on the second picture you can see the super cutie felted doggy slippers grandmommy knit her)

all three girls received felted clog slippers knit by grandmommy...we love our warm feet! :)

a glimpse of the aftermath


we spent lots of time outside as well (and by "we" poppy and daddy provided the bulk of the fun!)--the girls loved sledding down the slope in the side yard (perfect for them!)



and yes...here is proof that 30+ week prego me did take a turn! my dad took a video of the event, but i'll spare you that footage! :)

perhaps the favorite event for kate was "ice sledding"...daddy and poppy tied rope to the sleds and pulled the girls in circles on the icy lake....they had a blast...they would occasionally get going so fast they fell off, but they were quick to get back on. the giggles and screams of delight were endless and contagious!

we also borrowed some skates from a neighbor, and elizabeth took to them amazingly. poppy gave her some instruction, but she quickly took off on her own with just two minor falls...she really was a natural!


kate got a turn too...she wasn't quite as sure or steady, but she definitely was not going to miss out after seeing all the fun sissy had! maybe we'll have to invest in some skates!



and finally...some video of the ice sledding...the tears at the end are because kate took a spill...no worries, she was back up and at it just moments later! :) (hint...press the button in the bottom right to make the video full screen so you can actually "see" it!)