Christmas Eve

We have had such a nice Christmas Eve.  Our day started out rather typical with cleaning the house.  Santa doesn't like to visit dirty houses so first thing was to make sure that everything was in order.

Throughout the day we've been tracking Santa at Norad tracks Santa.  They follow Santa as he makes his deliveries all over the world.  Not only do we go to our large wall map to see where he's at but we also get to see him fly!

In the afternoon, following Lucy's nap we sat down and watched a movie together.  We rented Disney's "A Christmas Carol"  and rather enjoyed it.  There were a few times that Olivia got scared and would just shake. Poor thing!  We had to explain that it was all pretend.

Olivia getting ready to watch the movie.  The big bowl of popcorn was for everything to share.

At times Lucy would watch the movie too, although most of the time she was busy playing with the toys.

Following the movie it was time to get the table set for our Christmas Eve dinner.  It turned out rather pretty and we had time to sing Christmas carols and watch the girls danced.

We decide to do something a little different this year instead of our traditional turkey or ham.  We had a pot roast that cooked all day in the slow cooker.  It is always so tender and juicy this way.  We had yummy rolls, rice and sparkling cider to go with it.  For desert we had a turtle cake and homemade wassail.

Lucy enjoying the cake

Every year we like to take a family photo in front of our Christmas tree.  Naturally the girls put on their new Christmas dresses (why don't I buy a new Christmas dress for myself?!) and try to get at least one shot with everyone looking at the camera.  Always a difficult task!

A tradition from my childhood is to open one gift on Christmas Eve and it's always a new pair of pajamas.

Olivia was super excited to receive a rob with her pajamas!

Finally it was time for bed so we watched Luke 2.  After we put Olivia down I realized that we forgot to put out cookies for Santa and feed the reindeer!  At this point Olivia had been in bed for about 5 minutes so I decided it would be fine to get her up.

At Candlelight Christmas we put together reindeer food which was basically oats with sugar.  I've also seen people make it with oats and glitter so the reindeer can see it as they fly over.

We've been asking Olivia what she wanted to leave out for Santa and her reply has been toast and macaroni & cheese.   Since we nearly forgot leave a treat at all for Santa he gets left over gingerbread cookies.  The reindeer get candy at our house instead of a carrot (Olivia's request).  We'll see if it makes a difference!