Christmas and New Years

Finally!  I'm over a month behind but I'm getting around to posting about our wonderful winter holidays!  We spent Christmas with David's family in Lexington this year and had a great time!  We left Richmond on the 22nd and headed to Oma and Opa's house.  We spent the next few days hanging out with Oma, Opa, Uncle Peter and Aunt Anne and helped cook and decorate the Christmas tree. Juliann even got to decorate a miniature tree that Opa got for both girls!  It was the cutest little tree and Jules loved seeing all of her presents underneath it!

 Jules decorating the mini tree!

Opa and his girls

The girls tree BEFORE Santa visited!

Christmas Eve was busy but so exciting!  Jules was actually still able to fit into her Santa dress from last year and looked as adorable as ever!  She really enjoyed the service at church and especially liked being able to hold her very own candle.  Josie was also well behaved during the service, although she didn't quite understand why she wasn't allowed to hold a candle!  After church, we headed over to a party with David's extended family.  Although we've been together for 11 years, we usually spent Christmas Eve with my family so it was neat to finally meet his extended family!  Finally, we headed over to the Pickrals house for another party.  The Pickrals have a grandson, Joseph, a few months older than Juliann and she LOVED playing with him....and his toys!  Eventually, the girls became exhausted so we headed home.  Jules helped us put out milk and cookies for Santa and headed up to bed.  She was so surprised early the next morning that Santa had eaten all but a bite of his cookies.  She was even more thrilled when we let her finish the cookie!  She kept saying, "I got to eat Santa's cookie!"  She just couldn't believe that she ate his leftovers-it was too cute!

 Family picture on Christmas Eve

 Jules putting out cookies for Santa

Jules was also SUPER excited about all of her gifts.  I swear, my two kids made out like bandits this year!  I have never seen so many presents and we must have opened presents for at least 4 hours!  Not to mention we let her open all the gifts from us the day before!  We had so many presents we had to ask David's aunt and uncle to take some back to Richmond for us because there was no way it was all going to fit in our car!

 Presents...

 and MORE presents!

 Jules excited to open her gifts!

 Josie the reindeer

 Jules starting to open her art easel from Santa

 Chef Jules

Josie trying out some of her presents

 Josie opening up her baby doll with help from Patrick

 Jules with her UVa piggy bank from Susan and Bill

Jules helping Uncle Peter open a gift

We left Sunday and headed back home.  We were supposed to drive over the mountain to see my parents and have lunch but the impending bad weather had us going straight home.  We met up with my parents later that week and the girls got even more gifts that we had to figure out how to get home!  Can we say spoiled?!?!?  :)

 Jules opening her tea set from Sugars

 Loving the digital camera!

Josie opening her pop up toy from Sugars

We spent New Years at the lake and enjoyed relaxing with friends and swimming in the indoor pool.  The indoor hot tub was also a big hit with the moms!  2011 has already gotten off to a great start and we are hoping it continues!  I know I'm a little late in saying this but Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you all!