Christmas 2013

For a recap of this years Christmas festivities I should just copy and paste from previous years. The kick off to Christmas started with Santa coming to Coronado via the ferry. They had all sorts of activities at the Ferry Landing that day, including bounce houses, cookies and hot chocolate, ornament decorating, cookie decorating, and a snow hill. That night Coronado held their Christmas parade along Orange Avenue. 

We also checked out the Boat Parade the next week and had our best seats yet! We walked down to a dock that we had always thought was private, but turns out it isn't! It also happened to be next to the judges so the boats were sure to come up close to the dock. 

I wanted to go to our Stake's live Nativity, but like most holiday seasons one or more of us was under the weather and we had to miss it. 

Seth and I went the Anesthesia Dept Holiday Dinner at a hotel downtown. It's always fun getting dressed up for a date. My hair looked better earlier in the night. Sigh. 

Letters to Santa. Taft asked for a Finn McMissile that shoots ink, a Lego police car, and a grabber.  Luke asked for a Lightening McQueen and a Mater. 

Our ward holiday party was chaotic. For the last couple years the Primary was in charge of the Christmas party and they would put on the Nativity. This year the party planning responsibilities changed and we had a "Christmas Around the World".  Our ward has a lot of diversity in cultural backgrounds so it was fun to try all kinds of different ethnic foods. 

Taft's preschool puts on a short singing program around Christmas and Easter each year. He did a great job. Unfortunately Seth had to miss it this year. 

It was our warmest Christmas yet so we headed to the beach Christmas Eve. At this point Seth was out in the water with his SUP. Later in the night we had our fancy dinner, opened pjs and Christmas books, and left out cookies and milk for Santa. Sidenote: Poor Taft forgot that our  Christmas Eve present is always pjs. He was excited to open a present and the disappointment on his face was heartbreaking. He was trying so hard not to cry but I saw his eyes filling with tears. He wasn't snotty about it, just disappointed and unable to hide it. I also had the epiphany that since we're having all boys the pjs tradition will probably just be something they tolerate and eventually protest. I loved this tradition as a kid!

 The next photos are my attempt to get a shot in their Christmas Sunday outfits.

The boys woke up Christmas morning happy to find that Santa had fulfilled their requests. I was horrible at taking pictures but we got a little bit on video. We had invited some friends to spend the afternoon with us and had plans to have a bonfire dinner at the beach. I came down with a most terrible cold and had to withdraw the invitation. I felt terrible about it, but spent a good part of the day in bed, slowly dying. The best part of Christmas was seeing the boys so excited and having Seth around all day for both Christmas Eve and Christmas Day!