Merry Christmas!

We could not have had a merrier, happier or more blessed Christmas!  The arrival our little early Christmas present made this Christmas an especially joyous one.  What a fabulous time of year to be born! 

A little stocking stuffer

This is such a magical time of year for little ones and I have loved seeing the excitement and pure joy in Riley over all things Christmas.  She loves the tree, the decorations, our holiday books, "Udolph", her elf on the shelf, gingerbread house decorating...and eating, cookie baking, zoo lights, lights on houses, the Grinch, her Christmas jammies, her advent surprises, Santa and of course the presents.

 We spent Christmas Eve going to the children's mass at our church and then heading to Gigi, Popdaddy's house where we spent the rest of the night, eating our fave pasta, opening lots of gifts and having fun with our family. 

They don't really make special occasion dresses in premie sizes so Piper's outfit was absolutely huge on her, but it made me happy to see my 2 girls in their matching Christmas dresses.

We were all excited to have Aunt Judi, Uncle John and the McGuffee's with us this Christmas.  Riley absolutely loves when they are all around and both of our girls were spoiled by their Aunts, Uncles and cousins.

Riley could hardly wait to dive into the presents under Gigi and Pop's tree.  Now that she can read her own name, she helped to find all of her presents.  She loved having an audience for opening all of her gifts and we loved watching her reactions as she dug into her surprises.  Gigi and Pop and also her aunts and unlces gave her tons of great gifts and I was so proud of her good manners and gratitude as with each package she would say "Oh, thank you!  It's just what I wanted!!!"

Riley had quite the list for Santa this year and had even ranked her wishes in order of importance...1.) Flipper Ariel tail, 2.)Rapunzel dress, 3.)Doll, 4.)Kitchen

Roo must have been very good, because Santa left absolutely no room for disappointment. 

After playing for a while with her Santa surprises, Riley was ready to dig into the rest

of the presents under the tree

She was also the designated opener/helper for everyone else's gifts too, especially Piper's since she was too little to do it herself.  Riley would open Piper's gifts and then show them to her...

"look at what you got Pipey!"

Kris and Riley doing their signature knuckle bump and blow up

Piper was completely exhausted by the excitement,

so she spent most of the day doing what makes her

happiest...sleeping and being snuggled on

We spent the afternoon of Christmas having lunch and opening presents at

Grandma and Grandpa Nelson's.  Riley decided that the perfect attire for the day was her

Christmas jammies with her new Rapunzel dress on top.  Perfect!

Riley and Piper were spoiled again with some really great stuff...

There was some serious winding down in order after all of the excitement of our

Christmas celebrations, so we spent the rest of the day relaxing, working on a puzzle 

watching Roo play with her new toys.  

The day after Christmas, Uncle David, Aunt Ruthie and our cousins Cyd and Reece drove up from Oklahoma for a few days.  Riley was so excited about her cousin Reece coming to visit and as always they had a great time together and we all enjoyed getting to have lots of our family around to celebrate Christmas.

We had a totally happy Christmas and have enjoyed all that the holiday seaon had to offer.  2011 brought us so many blessings that we are so very thankful for...especially our sweet new baby girl.  We can't wait see what 2012 has in store!  Happy New Year!