Holiday recap/recovery

It has been a while since the holiday season ended and since I last posted. The Holiday season was a lot of fun for us. It was especially fun to see Steven at Christmastime. We always have a hectic holiday season with lots of get-togethers with friends, family and church. That's what makes the holiday's fun though. We spent Christmas Eve with my family. My parents always do a big dinner and we play games and watch movies. It started snowing around teh time we got there (1 in the afternoon) so Steven went out with the men to help shovel the driveway. It snowed pretty much all night while we were there so when it came time to go back to our apartment, I decided rather than go out in the snow, I would send Matt to get some of the things we needed and we would sleep at my mom's house. He was the hero of the day and went along with my plan. Christmas morning we got up and opened socks and presents (We all got coal. Matt is pictured with his.) until 9 am. Then we called Brian, my brother, in San Diego. It was great to talk to him, but he comes home in about three months so we didn't talk as long as last year. After that we finished opening presents and played with our loot. Steven really cleaned up getting mostly toys from my mom. He has a lot of fun playing with the stuff once it was opened, but didn't really care about actually being the one to rip off the paper. Maybe next year. After we were done unloading the boxes we had a big box of styrofoam packing peanuts. Matt and Michael sat Steven in the middle of the floor and dumped them on top of him. Not only is this super fun for Steven, but it also has traditional significance. My Uncle Steve (who Steven is named after) used to dump boxes of packing peanuts on me and my brothers when we were little. After the cleanup, we got ready to go out to my Grandma's. We always go to her house for Christmas ham and lots of munchies. Then we exchange gifts among the extended family. Steven's favorite part of all this was the bows on the presents. I gave one of our "adopted" family members a framed collage of pictures of our family from different holiday's and camping trips. It was a lot of fun to look at it with everyone and share memories. Overall a great Christmas.
After Christmas, we went down to visit with Matt's family and attend the wedding of Matt's cousin Evan. On our way back home we stopped at Temple Square so Steven could see the Christmas lights. It was a little cold but Steven loved to see all the lights and the Temple. My favorite part of Temple Square at Christmastime is seeing the nativities that they have from all over. Going to Temple Square was a great way to wrap up the holiday season and remind ourselves of why we celebrate Christmas.