What's better than cousins? Matching cousins!

Snuggles with my little Luke.

This picture that my brother took cracked me up. I'm assuming it's from a singalong.

Joey got a new Pokemon video game for Christmas, and the Gallo kids were almost as excited as Joey was about his new game. We got Lauren a little stuffed Pokemon for Christmas. It came with a clip on it to attach it to a backpack. Lauren had "Chimchar" clipped to her clothes for the rest of their trip.

Reading with Hannah.

One night the adults were playing games downstairs at our house, so the kids went up to the master bedroom and watched, The Star, our favorite Christmas movie.

Ben, Lauren and Nathan slept over at our house one more night after Christmas. In the morning, Nathan wanted to sit up on the counter while I was making my usual quart of tea. He wanted some, so I got him a little plastic teacup from our kitchen.

I didn't think he'd actually drink much of the tea, but he sat on the counter for over an hour while I constantly poured him tea about an inch at a time. The two of us polished off the whole quart. It was one of my favorite memories from the Gallos' trip. It reminded me of when Luke was about that same age, and we had tea time together in Carmel.

 

The last full day of the Gallos' visit was Ellie's birthday. She's now officially in the double digits! We took Ellie out to lunch at Chick-fil-A, and then headed over to my parents' house.

James was born on April 28th, so these two were exactly 10 and 8 months old on December 28th.

The Meisters and Andy's parents all came over for Ellie's birthday dinner. Ellie gets most of her birthday presents in June for her half birthday, but she had a few to open which was fun.

My mom made an eggnog cake for Ellie and Hannah used her new cake decorating supplies to make a chocolate Oreo cake for her. Both cakes were delicious!

We were soaking up all of the Gallo snuggles that we could.

My parents gave all of the kids sparklers for Christmas. It was a fun way to end Ellie's birthday and the Gallo's visit. 

The next day my dad and I drove the Gallos to the airport. Then I came back and hung out with my parents and Timmy and Jill for a while. Timmy and Jill were headed down to San Diego to hang out with some friends, and then they were leaving at an obscene time the next morning because they wanted to drive back to Denver in one day. Thankfully everyone made it home safe and sound!

Christmas morning is literally my favorite part of the whole year! 

We still have the tradition of having the kids go one at a time through the white sheet. 

 I thought the whole white sheet thing sounded weird when Andy first told me about it, but the kids absolutely love it.

Stockings first.

Joey got to open the first present...

because he needed to join in the Christmas jammies coziness. He grew so much (he's 6'1'' now) that he doesn't fit in his pajamas from last year. He specifically asked for a onesie this year.

I just love watching all of the kids open their presents. I always wondered what age your kids have to be to have a fun, relaxed Christmas where everyone takes turns opening presents, and you stop midway to eat breakfast. The answer is 15, 12 and (almost) 10. We've arrived! It was my favorite Christmas morning ever.

Hannah cracked up that I bought her a package of Madeleines for Christmas. She's always begging me to buy them at the grocery store.

Still excited about the Pop-Tarts from the night before...and his new onesie.

Ellie loves getting Andy Taco Bell t-shirts.

Grandpa Hammond, who passed away last year, always got Andy's mom cherry jelly for Christmas. We wanted to continue that tradition. Ellie inherited her grandmother's love of cherry jelly, so they both got some.

Andy got his Dad a t-shirt from his favorite restaurant growing up-the Original Westlake Joe's He still goes any time he's in the area for business.

The sweet cuddling on the couch may have been a Christmas miracle, but it didn't last long!

The guys were all happy about the games and electronics they got.

Andy's cousin, Phil, randomly saw that Zelda puzzle at a store and thought of Andy so he sent it to him for Christmas. We took this picture to thank him.

Later that afternoon we headed over to my parents's house for Christmas dinner. We played Codenames. Somehow it's impossible for us to play that game without cheating.

For Christmas dinner this year we went with enchiladas, rice and beans. It was a big hit!

We ended the night with another Christmas singalong.

Christmas Eve we gathered for our traditional pre-church pictures.

Krause cousins

These are all of my parents' grandkids until Benjamin and Christina's baby, whom we affectionately refer to as "Roger Chorizo," is born in February.

We took our biennial sibling picture, but we missed Benjamin.

We couldn't decide if we liked his high school graduation picture more...

or his preschool one.

After church, it was present time!

Joey was super excited about this jumbo box of Pop-Tarts.

This gift made us all laugh!