Family Christmas Parties

We had a few more family Christmas parties in December. First was the Tucker Christmas party with my Grandma, aunts, uncles, cousins and their kids. It's always crazy when we all get together but I think a pretty good time was had by all. My family was in charge this year and we decided to bring back our Nativity tradition with the great-grandkids. I thought they did pretty good for their first time. Afterwards we opened some presents from Grandma and then played some "Minute To Win It" games. I was organizing the games and running the timer so I didn't get any pictures with our camera, darn it. But if I had there would have been some good pictures of some crazy antics. We ended the night playing a blindfolded tag game. That was pretty crazy too!

The Sunday before Christmas we had a family party at my parents' house with my siblings. We had a great dinner (as usual) and then exchanged gifts. My parents always put together a special gift for each of us to open. This year they gave each of us (including the babies) a copy of "The Book of Mormon" with their testimony in it. They also gave us bookmarks that looked like round-trip train tickets back to our Heavenly Father that reminded us to "Believe" (kind of like in "The Polar Express" but this was to believe in Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ). They also gave each of us bells like the one in "The Polar Express" to remind us to believe in our Heavenly Father. Leah loves her bell and shakes it all over when we let her play with it. I'm surprised she hasn't whacked herself in the head with it yet! Lyndsee was able to get each of the kids a pair of sunglasses. Here is Leah sporting hers...

We tried to get all of the kids to wear theirs together for a picture. With the little babies constantly trying to take theirs off, this is the best we could do. But Kaylynn's smile is so cute here that it makes up for her taking off her glasses just before the picture was taken!

On Christmas Eve we went to Ross's mom's house for a Leslie family party with his siblings. After a yummy Italian themed dinner, we did the Nativity and then exchanged gifts. Tamaran's family even joined us on the computer via Skype for the gift exchange. It was fun to be able to see and talk with them.

The battery on our camera died during our reenactment of the Nativity, so here are the pictures I was able to get...

Mary, Joseph and a very handsome Innkeeper...

The Shepherds, including a cute little pink lamb...

The Angel announcing the birth...

And a very cute and happy Baby Jesus...

I'm sorry I didn't get a picture of the Wise Men in their pimpin' costumes! There's nothing quite like seeing Kyle and Don sporting their pink and purple robes!