Have yourself a merry little Christmas

 

This year I was so excited for Gatlin's first Christmas! I wanted to bottle up every minute of the season and just film/photograph every detail! It just had to be perfect. You don't get to redo a first Christmas! Ha!

Christmas Eve morning John's siblings and dad came over to our house for Christmas brunch. I have to say I hope this tradition sticks! I loved it! We weren't rushed to be anywhere else and we go to enjoy each other!

There were three very cute babies!

 

Gatlin was a little tired after opening all the presents!

Before we went to the Candlelight Service at our church, we baked some cookies for the sweet nurses that we had the week before at Muskogee Community Hospital. They were so good to us and we wanted to let them know how much we appreciated them. (We saved a few for Santa ;) ) 

Getting good family pictures is hard! ha! 

After Candlelight we went to my grandparents house to see my dad's side of the family. Then it was time to come home and get ready for Santa! We debated back and forth on whether we would tell Gatlin about Santa. We decided that we would first tell Gatlin about Jesus' birth and explain that Santa brings presents to celebrate His birth. But also that mom and dad give gifts to celebrate Jesus' birthday too! We tried to get Gatlin's reindeer jammies on but the little monkey has a little bit of a bigger head (his dad's fault!) we had to laugh because he is just so darn cute!

Then we read the Christmas story from Luke followed by the Night before Christmas as narrated by Pappy.  

Christmas morning I mad a very "nutritious" breakfast and we opened presents just the 3 of us. 

Then we went to my parent's house in our pajamas and opened presents with them.

Doesn't Gat make a pretty girl?!?

I love the fact that both sides of my family (mom's and dad's sides plus John's dad) come over to my parent's house for Christmas day lunch. I am blessed to have them all together in one place. After we ate lunch and rested for a few hours we went to John's sister Shannon's house for Christmas with Mike and Linda. We also got a family picture with the ENTIRE family!!!  

Papa Mike and Mia got Gatlin the cutest rocking horse that moves and neighs! (Never mind it is for ages 3 and up! ha!) Gatlin liked it until Mia insisted that the cousins share the new toy.  

I just love this picture!!! This is MY horse Kyle!!! I can only imagine how crazy it will be when Gatlin, Lincoln, and Kyle are all sharing toys! 

It was a wonderful Christmas. We are truly blessed for our family. We often complain that we have so many places to be during a short period, but even with a 4 month old it was a blessing to have to many places that we get to go!

Excuses

I have no excuses for not blogging.... but I haven't been blogging because.... being a stay at home mom is so much more work than I had anticipated! Don't get me wrong, I love love love my new job, I just had very high expectations of what I would be able to accomplish while I was home! John had to sit me down and have a little pep talk with me, and I quote, "I don't expect you to re-shingle the roof while I am at work!" Somehow my little big man takes more work that I had remembered from maternity leave!

I finally feel like we are getting into a good flow of things now though. Gatlin had to spend 4 nights in the hospital the week before Christmas and that totally ruined any sense of a schedule that we had working for us. It took a good 2 weeks to establish, that yes, we have to take naps, and yes we have to sleep alone in our own crib.

I also feel like I clean the kitchen no less than 3 times a day.... I am not sure how or why it works that way, but nonetheless I feel like I am constantly cleaning my kitchen! Have I ever mentioned that I am a very gold, type-A, analytical person? Especially when it comes to cleaning!!! I have to clean my house in a certain order. Kitchen, then living room, then the hall bath, nursery, office, then master bath and bathroom. I am not sure why I can't clean out of this order, but I just can't! So needless to say our office and master bedroom and bath remain a disaster!!! I think I may try reversing the order for a while, but then I couldn't stand it if my kitchen and living room weren't clean... So probably won't happen.

In other news. In a few weeks we will have another sweet baby during the day. Our sweet nephew Lincoln will be spending his days with Gatlin and me. I am very excited for when the boys are big enough to actually "play" together. I am not going to lie. I am a little nervous about having two babies, but I think after a few weeks we will get into a good routine! I also know that I would rather him be with me than anyone else (besides his mom!), so I am glad to be able to offer this to Caitlin and Cameron.

Our days are filled with lots of cuddles and laughter and I am such a blessed mom and wife!