Christmas is the time...

The busyness of the holidays were a little crazy, but it was so much fun celebrating Parker's 1st Christmas!  The best part was having Joel home for 2 whole weeks!  I took a few days off of work so we could have more time together too!  The weather has been crazy this December...no snow yet and 50 degree weather!  No complaints here!  We have spent time going for walks, jogs and hikes....soaking it all in for as long as it lasts!

We spent much of the month of December chasing after the Jingle Bell Rock...unfortunately we did not find it!  Joel and I looked in the correct vicinity 4 days before it was found, but due to some miscommunication we didn't look in all of the bushes behind Zeeland Schwinn and missed it!  Parker was such a trooper through all of the 7:30am and 5:00pm scavengers throughout Zeeland in his stroller.  He was often left on the sidewalk while i looked through the bushes! I am glad CPS wasn't called!

Christmas Eve we were able to go to Engedi's service and then spent the night with the Nagelkirks.  We had such a great time spending the night together, and it was fun to watch the kids open their presents and be so excited!  Parker liked to see what other people were opening...mostly so he could eat the wrapping paper!  Ninjagos were the gift of the year for all of the boys!  After opening gifts the rest of the night was spent battling Ninjagos!

Christmas morning was spent at home just the three of us!  It was a relaxing morning reading the Christmas story to Parker and showing him the figurines that went with the story.  He had a hard time focusing on the story because he was attacking the figurines.  We knew Parker was going to get a lot of presents from other family members so we just got him one gift...a toy that made farm animal noises!

Christmas day we headed to the Lambert household where we threw a birthday party for Jesus!  We had a fun afternoon eating lots of food, watching the kids open presents, and of course playing the Pickle game, which I am happy to report that Joel and I won!!!!  VICTORY!!!

We took close to 20 pictures trying to get one where everyone is looking and smiling!  We had to settle on this one...Parker is more interested in looking at grandpa but everyone else is smiling!

Parker's new "Nipple Balls" that he really likes!  That was definitely the joke of the day!

The day after Christmas we spent the night with the Nagelkirk extended family.  It is always a fun time of playing the gift exchange game, bowl game, Catch Phrase and this year Around the World ping pong!  Joel and I walked away with the grand prize...6 fried cinnamons and 6 pigs in the blanket!