Christmas Eve

We've started a new tradition at my house - for the past few years I've hosted Christmas Eve at my house. I cook a big pot of tortilla soup and lay out a spread of some of our favorite Christmas treats and we play board games for the rest of the evening. Ella was old enough this year to play some of her games - Perfection, Candy Land, Kerplunk and Operation.

The kids had fun performing "Jingle Bell Rock" for us. Poppy bought them a little reindeer a few years ago that plays the song and the kids love it - Ella turns it on then they both sing and dance to it. And, yes, Christian is wearing Ella's pink shoes in the picture.

Before the kids went to bed, we continued a tradition that Court had growing up by letting the kids open one gift. Ella opened the Barbie babysitter play set and Christian opened his Hess truck. My mom thought the tradition was fun, so she brought over a gift for them to open - American Girl ballet clothes for Ella's American Girl doll and a dance cam for Christian.

Ella was so excited to model her new Christmas pajamas, courtesy of Mimi. Debbie gave me money to buy the kids gifts from them and these pajamas were one of the things that I bought. Ella loves them. She got to wear them to school on Polar Express day.

All of us adults played an intense game of Clue after the kids were asleep. Dad won.