What A Wonderful Christmas!

 Today is the day after Christmas, and I've mostly been resting and cleaning up a bit and just trying to relax after all the activity of the past few weeks.  I have been having some back spasms that are stress related, so I took a muscle relaxer last night, thinking it would help me relax and sleep better. It didn't. It made me very groggy and dopey this morning, so after breakfast I went back to bed for about an hour and slept so soundly John had to wake me up. I decided I wasn't going to take any more muscle relaxers. They relaxed everything except my muscles. LOL.  So now, after two naps today I am finally awake enough to think about writing a post about our wonderful Christmas day!  Actually, I will just share pictures and explain as we go.

I will start with Christmas Eve.  

This was the scene in the living room right after "Santa" delivered the gifts for everyone. I know it looks like a lot, but someone here (Mr. Santa Claus) loves to give lots of little fun gifts and spread them out between many packages so it looks like a lot of gifts, but it's not exactly what one might think...and thankfully that someone helped wrap all those gifts!

Earlier in the evening our son Scott, who had arrived late the night before so he could take care of his car that is kept here before the freezing weather arrived (it's a project older Camaro...his "baby"), got busy and baked a batch of our family traditional Orange Cookies. (My mother's recipe that she always made anytime the grandchildren were coming to visit. Recipe can be found on that link).  

Oh, for those of you who are "Lily Grace" fans, she was there helping Scott ice the cookies. She is wearing her new Christmas dress that her "Auntie Debbi" in South Carolina sent her for Christmas.

Here's a better picture of her as she helped me set the table for the next day...

Now if you are a Facebook fan you may have already seen most of these pictures. But for the rest of you here's the story of our Christmas Day.  It started out with hubby and I going to Sunday School and Church, as he teaches the adult class and I sing in the choir and we help serve Communion, and so we wanted and needed to be there. It was a rather chilly experience as the heat in our antique church building just couldn't keep up with the freezing temperatures of 23 degrees in the morning,  and we had to keep our coats and gloves on all the way through church to keep warm. I think it had finally gotten above 58 degrees in the sanctuary by the time church was over. LOL. I know for many of you that is no big deal, but for us Floridians, 23 degrees on Christmas morning is a big deal!

Then we came home and started putting our Christmas dinner together. I had already prepared the  jello salad and the sweet potato casserole the night before, so it just needed to be heated, and the green beans and Stove top stuffing could be done when we got home,  and Rose was roasting the Cornish hens and other items at their house. They went to the Saturday night Christmas Eve service so they could stay home Christmas morning and prepare the rest of the food. Our friend, the other "Pamela" you will see in the pictures, brought two delicious  cream pies and Rose and baked two pies the day before. We had a very delicious dinner as you can see...

Everyone is anxious for me to quit taking pictures so they can start eating...

Scott took a picture of his plate so you could see everyone had their own personal Cornish Hen. I had never had one before, and actually Hubby and I split one so we could eat all the other stuff. It was a LOT of food, but oh so good!

 Here's the two "Pamela's"...double trouble...

And here's me with my sweet hubby...

Okay, pictures are over, now let's eat it before it gets cold!

After dinner and cleaning up the table/dishes (thank you kids for pitching in!)

we started opening gifts...Rose and Benton need calendars to keep track of time... LOL (we ALL got calendars).

I am wearing a wool skull cap, a gift from the kids for our trip to North GA mountains in January...they also got me warm socks and bathrobe and fleece pants, etc.  I should be very warm, and actually am wearing the socks and fleece pants now...it's that cold...

Scott with his pile of gifts...

And then he opened a gift from "Santa"...and all pandemonium broke loose...because ...

Rose and Benton also got the same gift from Santa...and I've never seen this side of our sweet, quiet DIL before! It was hilarious...

And poor little Baby Elva was trying to duck in her buggy to avoid the flying nerf projectiles...(yes, Elva is a doll...she was just fine...)

Rose really got into action...

But so did Scott...he had two nerf guns...

And I think I was the next target, but I managed to duck in time...

Uh oh! Daddy got one that shoots 4 nerf bullets!

And he is very cool, calm and calculating...

Benton had his gun and was doing his part, and if you notice, Rose is hiding behind the very messed up sofa!  Lily Grace is lying prostrate on the table...I think she fainted...

And our dear friend Pamela had no clue what she was getting into when she accepted the invitation to Christmas dinner...but she had a blast and said she'd be happy to come again...most fun she's had in a long time...

I think Benton was about to surrender below...Rose was holding him up from behind...

All in all a crazy but wonderful time was had by all! I should have recorded the laughter! It was pure hilarity in the house!

Then Benton and Rose remembered they had one more gift to bring in for us...actually it's for "Daddy" at my request, but I will use it too.  This beautiful vintage cedar chest was painted and refurbished by Benton from their store, Dixie Cottage, as a gift for John to put some special things in. He actually had seen it at the store before it was painted, and remarked at how much he liked it and would love to have something like that. So I told Benton behind his back to take it off the sales floor and prepare it for Daddy for Christmas as a surprise.  He was disappointed to come into the store the next day and find out that the chest had been "sold".  

But he was sure surprised to see it show up here at our house on Christmas morning with a fresh new look! I love it when we can pull off a real surprise once in a while!

After all the fun and games and gifts we had worked up enough appetite to have dessert.  So here's the pies...they were all delicious...

After all the excitement was over and everyone had gathered up their goodies and gone home, our grandson Noah called us from Maine. We were sad that he didn't get to talk to his "uncles", but there again, we were glad that we got to have him all to ourselves, and we talked for almost an hour. It was SO good to hear his voice and get caught up on all of his (& and his fianc'ee Dawn's)  goings on.  He said they had been without power for a couple of days because of the winter storm, but thankfully they have a wood stove and were able to keep warm. I told him I had been praying for all the people without power up north, that they would be safe and find warmth...and I didn't even know my own family was in that group needing prayer!  So thankful God heard our prayers and they are all fine.  I know many others in the country were not as fortunate. Quite a few people have died in this winter storm. It has truly been brutal for so many.  So I really can't complain about our 23 degrees. Our house is warm and we do not have any icy/snowy roads to contend with. Very thankful indeed.

And so, with that I will conclude our Christmas day celebrations. We truly have been blessed and are very very thankful to God for all of His provision and kindness toward us. 

And most of all for His Son, Jesus Christ our Savior...the best gift of all, Who just keeps on giving and giving!

Here are some lovely scenes on Still Waters Pond this afternoon before sunset:

The Canada Geese have been flying in and out again lately...

and then the Sand Hill Crane couple flew in for the evening and the geese immediately swam cross the pond to go welcome them:

Then the sun began to set on a beautiful day...it will go down to below freezing again by tomorrow morning, but should warm up to a balmy 57 degrees by afternoon, so we are climbing back up out of the deep freeze and we are very thankful indeed.

Oh, one more thing...speaking of ponds...I wanted to show you a sweet little gift from my sweet little DIL...first the street lamp over by the little church...

But next, the cute little tiny cabin and the red sleds...look really close at the little cabin:

There is a lady standing there on the porch with a camera in her hands, taking a picture of the skaters on the pond:

My sweet DIL found this somewhere and knew that I would love it, and she was right! First of all, my kids know that I am always taking pictures everywhere I go...and also, they know that my dream home is a log cabin...so this combination was perfect for me!  I was just so thrilled with this!

This makes for such a happy little scene...

Don't you agree?

Okay, this time I mean it...goodnight everyone!

Praying for you and yours, that you have had a blessed and beautiful Christmas, and that you are safe and warm wherever you are.

Looking forward to a Happy and hopefully warmer New Year!