Christmases Past

Before this year's Christmas pictures were uploaded I had started a post on Christmases past. I have such fond memories of Christmas growing up that I wanted to share that with all of you. Of course these are only of my digital memories which began in 2002. A lot of memories have been made in Decembers past. 32 years makes for a lot of Christmases but I LOVE IT! Christmas is my favorite holiday because it is so full of family and love. It fills my heart to be surrounded by such tradition! I hope that my children will feel this same sense of family and tradition as they grow up!

Our first Christmas tree in our new house 2002

The warmest tree hunt to date 2003 

Savanna loves her Uncle Forrest 2005

Tree hunting with the family  2006

Helping decorate Granny's tree 2007

Savanna and Santa were so busy chatting that Sadie almost fell  2008

                                 One of my favorites of all time at Nana and Poppy's house  2009

2004

The perfect Christmas tree

We enjoy our family tradition of finding a Christmas tree in the mountains and then heading to West Jefferson for lunch and shopping. Another stop along the way is the Ashe Cheese Factory. They always have yummy goodies for us to bring home. On this year's trip we were greeted by beautiful snow. As soon as we turned off of Hwy. 421 it began to flurry and then by the time we were less than a mile from the main highway it was really coming down. What a way to get in the Christmas spirit! It didn't take us long to find our trees and head into West Jefferson. That was a scary trip and in hindsight  we probably should have headed home instead but we do like tradition and we weren't finished with our adventure yet. We slid a couple of times, sideways, going down the mountain but luckily we weren't anywhere that there was much of a risk of us ending up down that mountain. The girls, of course, thought the sliding around was fun but Noah and I were a little on edge. I asked the girls to find a tree that was their height and they both came through. Savanna then found the one she wanted to take home. Unfortunately, it was as tall as our house so that wouldn't work. I would say that we found the perfect one for our new house!

Christmas Card Outtakes

Christmas of our Own

We may have finally found some traditions of our own to mix with the traditions of our childhoods. I am loving it! Our little family enjoys our time together and at church on Christmas Eve then on to Lexington on Christmas day. This year both of the girls wanted to be angels in the Spontaneous Christmas Pageant at church. Sadie is not afraid at all to be up there with the big kids. They were precious if I do say so myself. After church the plan was to come home and have dinner then presents. We ended up at the Mexican restaurant for margaritas and quesadillas for dinner then we did come home for presents. Here are the highlights of gift giving at our house. Savanna's artwork is on a sketchbook for Noah, there are silhouettes of both girls hanging in the living room and Super Sadie loved the new hair dryer and capes from mommy and daddy. Super Savanna also resides in our house and is available if you ever need a superhero.

Tanglewood

This trip was a surprise for the girls. We didn't tell them where we were going until we got there. They had been so excited to see Christmas lights this December that we wanted to show them the daddy of lights around. We had them convinced that the surprise was dinner at Chick-fil-a but then we kept driving. Of course we weren't going to drive an hour for Chick-fil-a! Savanna had fallen asleep in the car so she was full of energy for this excursion. We went on a Monday night so it wasn't crowded at all. The girls loved it! There were lights, lights, and more lights. And then we stopped to roast marshmallows.