Christmas 2010

Our time at home during Christmas was so full of activity and time with friends and family, that it would be impossible to write about everything. But here are some of the highlights. Within the first week of our arrival, we had two weddings at our church, so that kept us busy. I'm pretty sure I also had coffee or lunch with at least one friend a day for that first week. On top of all that, Ryan and I still had all of our Christmas shopping to do, so we were at the mall every chance we had. Then there are the necessities of every trip home - dentist appointments, washing the car, and going through our huge stack of mail.

A couple days before Christmas, we celebrated Ryan's birthday. While we were cooking dinner, my youngest sister, Rachel, called from her cruise to tell us she had just gotten engaged! Here I am with my middle sister, Rebekah, talking to Rachel on the phone:


We are super excited for Rachel and Kyle. Here is a picture of them on Christmas Day:


Mom made a delicious salmon dinner for Ryan - one of his favorite meals.


After dinner, Ryan opened his gifts, and then my aunt, uncle, and cousins came over for dessert.



On Christmas morning, we continued our tradition and had my grandparents over for breakfast.


Mom and Dad made the most amazing meal, as usual - egg casserole, homemade hashbrowns, coffee cake, and grapefruit.



Following our breakfast, we all made our way into the living room, where Dad read the Christmas story before we opened our gifts. I love our quiet Christmas mornings together as a family. I'm so glad we could be home for Christmas this year.


That evening, we looked out our window to see the most beautiful winter wonderland. Greenville has not had snow on Christmas for over 50 years!


Unfortunately, the snow meant that we had to cancel church the next day, and postpone leaving on our trip to Pennsylvania until Monday. I'll write about our trip in another post. But when we returned home the following weekend, we spent our final week at home shopping for a few things to bring back to Grenada and enjoying every minute with our families. It truly was one of the most special and memorable vacations we've ever had.