Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve is Christmas in my family.  We have a large family gathering on my mother's side.  We start by having a Thanksgiving style dinner with a huge variety of foods.  My grandmother made an amazing beef roast! I'll have to find out where that came from; it was AMAZING!  Did I already mention that? lol

The gang is growing in size!  My sister announced her engagement!

My handsome hubby!

Teresa and I

My aunt and cousin

Yep, that is right, my little cousins are all hanging out at the bar! ;-)

Well, the good news is that I know that Chris's reflectors really do work.

Grandma and I

Siblings and cousins

Being themselves

Christina and I

Mom and Dad

Just hanging out!

Anyways, we left for mass and afterwards the present opening begins.  It is always fun to see my younger cousins getting so excited about their gifts.  We had a very nice Christmas again this year.

Chris' mini un-official high school reunion

Chris' friends came back in town from all over the world... the furthest came from down under. That's right, Australia!  Others came from St. Louis, Ohio, Chicago, and more. We went to Esquire, which Chris swears I've been to before but haven't.  Then we ended the night at Merry Ann's.

Emily

Camera phones take blurry action pictures

Pretty smile

The gang

Good old Scott

Before / After

Thanks to my sister's generosity & Rod Sickler's stylist, I have bangs and layers. I was way overdue for a cut. Its been ten months.

Shop til you drop

I finished everyone on my Christmas shopping list last week, with one exception- Chris.  Well, Megan and I were chatting online and we both needed to buy a nice shirt for Christmas.  So an hour later, we were shopping. We had a nice lunch at Olive Garden and continued shopping.  We went to Kohls and Jessi met us there.  From there Jessi and I went to Gordmans, Meijer, Walgreens, and Dollar General.  We had a nice dinner at Rainbow Garden in Urbana and we had a yummy dessert of frozen yogurt at Skinni Girl's Frozen Yogurt. What a great night!!

Student gift

My student's mom S makes the most beautiful Christmas cookies. The gift wrap is nice too.

All wrapped up

<p>I started and finished wrapping ALL the Christmas gifts last night. I don't remember it ever taking so long in the past. I think I started at 1 am and finished around 3:30 am. Christmas is Sunday for the Painters! Pictured: the end result and my husband (I think it really captures EXACTLY how much he contributed.)

Children's service

I was happy that we could attend children's service Sunday morning. I was a little disappointed that the kids did not sing, but it was cute nonetheless.  I mean who can't help but smile watching confused small children looking upon the adults for guidance in the next dance move or help but laugh at the occasional collision of directionally challenged youngsters?