Christmas Eve!

It’s Christmas Eve and I should be sleeping to get rested for tomorrow, but the excitement is too overwhelming to catch any shut-eye right now!  I’m kinda hoping that staring at the computer will help tire my eyes 🙂  I can’t believe that it hasn’t even been a year since we brought our precious girl home with us.  We are just soaking up every single moment with her because it’s just such a blessing to have her in our family!

We started Christmas Eve out at church for our Candlelight Service.  It was truly beautiful, and such a great way to focus on the birth of our Savior.  

 After that we went to watch the musical, White Christmas with almost all of our family.  Such a fun way to start our Christmas festivities!!  As soon as we got home it was time to prep for the night!  We sprinkled reindeer food on the grass, read The Night Before Christmas, and put out cookies for Santa!

 We also had to say our goodbyes to Snowflake, our elf.  Joelle was scared to death of this little guy when he first showed up at our house, but she has grown quite fond of him.  Is it weird that I almost cried when I put him away?!  I just hate to see Christmas go!!

 Oh, and then our dogs found Santa’s cookies and took part in the eating of them 😉

 As soon as Joelle was tucked into bed, Santa came!  He left a bicycle, Elmo, and a matching outfit for Joelle and her baby 🙂  (And some shoes that I forgot to wrap…oops)

 And Snowflake gave a proper goodbye through a written note.  Because let’s be honest… saying goodbye in person would just be too emotional.  He left Joelle a Minnie Mouse and princess toothbrush since we will be visiting Disney World in March!

I am just anticipating the moment she steps foot in the living room, unwraps those presents, and plays with all of her goodies.  Such a difference from last year when we had to unwrap her presents for her and tuck things away in her room while we waited for her arrival.  The Lord has been good to us and He is faithful!