christmas with the smith's

my whole family came over last night to finally celebrate Christmas.
now that everyone is healthy and ready to enjoy each other!
we, of course, had to take some family photos...

getting set up...

the whole family!

grandma and papa and all their grandkids!

phill's family...now a family of 5!

2 week old Ayden. um, CUTE!

sawyer and uncle Steve

(with ayden around, sawyer seemed so BIG!)

so thankful for this sweet sister of mine.

it was fun to catch up.

laugh.

talk.

just BE together.

i loved my house feeling so full of people and love.

our family (rebekah's choice of outfit wasn't a battle i chose to fight...)

grandma and her newest grandchild during a rare few moments with his eyes open :-)

it was hysterical trying to get sawyer to sit still and pose with ayden.

they are so close in age.

yet so different right now.

"i love you, buddy." as she kisses his hand.

we had a nice meal.

the kids played so well.

it's fun, as they are getting older, to have them just run off and play together.

they played "hide and seek" a lot of the time.

here are the rules they wrote down:

*no locking doors

*no going in Courtney's room

*no going in bathroom

*no going in sawyer's room (he was sleeping)

*lights must be on in room

*you can't move places

*count to 20

*do not follow each other

*no one hide together

*you can't help the finder

*bailey can't be it

they pretty much covered it all, huh?

i lOVED the last one. :-)

and we exchanged gifts.

we really changed things a lot this year.

and it was obvious in a very good way.

the gift-giving was shorter. and less stressful.

and each gift was so much more meaningful.

such a wonderful night.

just being together.

i'm so thankful for each and every one of them!