Highlights from Christmas Eve

We had a wonderful Christmas holiday! Chad's parents and his sister and her family came to celebrate with us. Christmas Eve was a fun and busy day. Chad and I decided that this year we were going to get christmas preparations done early so that we could enjoy the holiday. We did pretty well. There were just a couple of things that I wanted to start that I didn't get to start before our company arrived. Luckily, I have a wonderful family and everyone pitched in to help get everything done.

I wanted to make the traditional treats, but I was busy sewing nativity costumes, so Chad, Mom, and Shannon set to work and made sure that my hopes were met. I really appreciate all of their hard work! Thank you so much!!! Check out the wonderful treats that everyone made.


We had a wonderful Christmas Eve meal! It is the traditional meal of the Monroe Family. We have a variety of breads and meats to make sandwiches, broccoli and cheese soup, chips and dip, veggies and dip, salads, and all the wonderful treats! The meal was so good, we had it almost every other night our guests were here (we did go out to eat occasionally). The kids had a lot of fun eating at the kid's table. We aren't sure how much any of the kids ate, but they had a lot of fun. The adults thoroughly enjoyed eating a meal in another room. We were able to eat most of our meal without any interruptions (an early Christmas gift)!




After dinner we let the kids open the traditional Christmas Eve gift. This year we got all of the cousins matching PJs. They were all excited about the PJs and quickly put them on. They got a big kick out of the PJs because all the PJs (with the exception of Madeleines) were way too big. I had hoped to fix that problem before Christmas Eve, but that wasn't in the cards, so instead the boys all rolled the pants several times to prevent them from falling off. Some even tucked their tops into their pants hoping that would help! It was pretty funny. Shannon got some good pictures of all the cousins.







After the silliness settled down, the kids got ready to act out the nativity. The kids did a good job. Grandpa read the bible story while the kids acted it out. Trevor and Madeleine were very convincing as Joseph and Mary. They had a sweet demeanor. Devon played a really cute shepherd boy. Shannon took a really sweet picture of Devon. Tanner played dual roles as the Innkeeper and a Wiseman. Dallin and Kaden played the other two Wisemen. It was fun to watch the kids act out the nativity, Growing up I acted out the nativity with my siblings and cousins, so it was a lot of fun for me to see the kids doing it. We tried to video the kids, but unfortunately only 2 minutes into it my card became full, so we didn't get to video the whole thing. I also didn't get to take any pictures. Luckily, Shannon took pictures. All of the pictures of the nativity were taken by Shannon. Thanks Shannon for capturing the sweet nativity scene. The pictures are beautiful!!