Crabtree Family Christmas

We've had a crazy Christmas, as usual, so it's taken me a while to find the time to post about our holidays. Christmas Eve was spent at Derek's grandma's house (Ranny's) where we had a casual evening opening gifts with family and playing Doug's annual horse race game. Claire was especially excited to finally be able to open some presents - she was taunted for weeks by the many presents under our tree. After we came home, Claire put out her cookies and milk for Santa and apples and carrots for the reindeer. After the kids went to bed, Derek and I had a nice evening opening our presents to eachother. This was the first year we did this, and we found that it was nice to be able to focus on eachother for once on Christmas.

The next morning, Claire was so excited to come out and see what Santa left for her. Santa got her an easel with all the accessories and Pops got her a kitchen. It was so hard to get her out the door after she opened all of her wonderful presents. Next, we were on our way to Derek's grandparents' house (Memaw and Papaw) where we have the "Crazy Crabtree Christmas." We opened tons of presents and played all kinds of crazy games and won all kinds of awesome prizes. Many of the prizes are gift cards or household items. I won't have to buy detergent for at least a year! This Christmas lasts hours, and just when you think it's almost over, we head down to Derek's parents' house for more. This is where we exchange with Derek's immediate family.

The next day we took a much needed breather and spent time organizing the house for the imminent cleanup. But just when you thought we were finally done, we jumped in the car Saturday morning and headed up to Austin to have Christmas with my stepdad. After Claire was done opening her presents there, it looked like the house was converted into a toy store! We left on Monday and had a couple days to regroup before living it up on Wednesday night for New Year's.

New Year's Eve we met our good friends Adam and Heather for dinner, a movie and a champagne toast. Derek's parents kept both kids overnight for the first time, and Carter only woke up once for 15 minutes in the middle of the night. I'm so proud of them both for being so good for their Nana and Dooj. We had a great time trying new foods (the restaurant was Korean and Japanese food). I fell asleep in the one movie I've wanted to see all year (Slumdog Millionaire), but woke up just in time to catch the ending and head back to the bar for a midnight toast. After another relaxing day with the whole family at home, it's back to the grindstone for Derek and back to school for Claire.

Hope you all had a wonderful Christmas/Holiday season! We'll see you in 2009!