The Best Christmas …

I know it seems like a lot of years I have said it was our best Christmas, but this year I really felt as though it was the best for as long as I can remember! I decided to take away a lot of the pressure of cooking on Christmas. We still had our traditional turkey dinner for Mom’s Birthday / Christmas and our Enchiladas lunch with the Merrill’s, but I decided to try to do as much prep work the day before as possible! Sandy and the kids were a great help with this! It made today run so smoothly!

The kids slept in as they often do and woke up just past 7am. We opened gifts with Matt, Mom & Dad watching the kids. It is definitely my favorite part of Christmas, watching their excitement and thankfulness! After presents we headed to our Christmas Service. It was a great casual service and then we were back home for lunch with the Merrill’s. After lunch Alex came and opened her gifts. And then this evening we had Mom’s Birthday supper/ Christmas Dinner.

The day moved at a nice slow pace and the kids were able to open and enjoy their presents without any rushing! I was most excited to give the girls our NKOTB Total Package Tour Tickets! I did a bit of a trivia with them to open them, took a video but it cut off half way. I was disappointed because their reactions were awesome! Made  me so thankful that I surprised them! I am so excited to share this experience with two of my favorites! Something that I have dreamed about since I was a kid and they are so excited to share it with me! And to top it all off we will get to have a Hampton Beach weekend while we are there since they will be performing in my favorite city, Boston! Our summer is going to be truly amazing, between this and our trip out West! I can hardly wait!

We also surprised Noah and Sandy with tickets to see the Globetrotters in April. Noah will love this and this is something that Sandy has always wanted to see as well, so it is awesome that they will get to do this together and share this experience! The kids were also excited about heading up to the city in just 2 sleeps to stay in a Suite and have the company of the Fisher’s and Merrill’s! The water slide looks amazing and they have Christmas money to shop with so they are excited!

I loved changing Christmas up a bit this year! Between the slower pace, down time between everything, types of gifts this year and the appreciation of these kiddos, it made for an amazing day! To end the day we played a game of Pie in the Face with the kids, my Mom and brother Matt! Talk about fun! The kids loved having Nannie participate as well! Great way to end a great Christmas!

There have been changes in my 2016 that have made me a better person today than I was last Christmas and I am looking forward to more changes in 2017! I have definitely learned this quote over the course of my life, but it is becoming more and more real to me lately! “Someday you will be extremely grateful that some things didn’t work out the way you once wanted them to…” Life happens and lots of things you do not have much control over, but in the end when you look at the big picture and allow God’s to put his plan first, it is amazing how much happier and at peace you and those around you can be!

So thankful for everyone in my life! Merry Christmas to you all!