December 23

We celebrated Christmas the evening of December 23 since Becky and Jason had to leave early the next morning. During the day everyone made food for Christmas dinner. That evening before we passed out the gifts we sang our first annual "Twelve Days of Christmas" (Stabley style). It goes like this:

On the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me: A house on Surfside Beach.
On the second day of Christmas my true love gave to me: Two little babies.
On the third day of Christmas my true love gave to me: Three square meals.
On the fourth day of Christmas my true love gave to me: Four generations.
On the fifth day of Christmas my true love gave to me: Five hour trip!!!
On the sixth day of Christmas my true love gave to me: Six diamond rings (including Holly's)
On the seventh day of Christmas my true love gave to me: Seven days of beaching.
On the eighth day of Christmas my true love gave to me: Eight hours of sleep (meaning 8 hours of sleep the whole week).
On the ninth day of Christmas my true love gave to me: Nine games of football (it seems like there was one football game after another on the TV).
On the tenth day of Christmas my true love gave to me: Ten little U-turns (from the bad Mapquest directions).
On the eleventh day of Christmas my true love gave to me: Eleven pounds of brisket (Jason made a ton of brisket for supper one night).
On the twelfth day of Christmas my true love gave to me: Twelve trips to Wal-Mart (I think someone went to Wal-Mart every single day that we were there...and sometimes twice a day!

Opening presents was interesting to say the least. Finley would open a present and get so excited only to have to set it aside to open the next present. I think we learned a lot from that experience. We'll have to let the kids open theirs throughout the day 1 at a time. That way they can play with them and look forward to opening another. Here are a few pictures from that day.

Aunt Deah (Sarah) and Finn feeding the birds again.

Finn holding Chloe. I love the expression on her face. It's like she secretly pleading with us to get her off of his lap.

Wow...what can I say? This is the second annual ugly outfit from Aunt Deah. Sarah will go out and purposely buy an ugly outfit for the babies. And yes, we meant to cut off his head in the picture. We don't like other people to know that it is really Finn wearing this thing. =) Look at the way he's pulling on it. He wants it off too!

Becky and Chloe opening Chloe's ugly outfit. Finn's was worse.

The cute mug that Bama and Paka got Finn.

Don't they all look so excited?

Running on the beach earlier in the day.

Becky opening up Chloe's camouflage outfit from us. Why is she laughing? I think it's adorable with white lace and little black bows at the top. =)

One giant Sumner.

Good picture of Becky and Chloe.

This was at the beginning of his breakdown. He was so tired, excited and hot...plus he had an ugly outfit on! That would just about do it for me too.

Chloe in her ugly outfit. She's shocked that Mommy put her in that. Becky can't even bear to look at it.