A Country Christmas

I always enjoy seeing other bloggers' family Christmas photos, so I thought I'd share a few of mine this year! We celebrate at the home of my dad, who lives much more out in the country compared to my neck of the woods, and my sister's family is building a new home next door. So after we all finished visiting our various churches this year (and Alex and I agree our church's service was one of our favorite things about Christmas), Christmas Day saw the usual bountiful lunch and gifts, a next-door home tour, and a visit with the goats and my niece Amelia's new miniature donkey, Itsy.

I'm afraid I can't quite remember which of the five goats is which, but I know these two are Fred and Ethel.

It is indeed more blessed to give than to receive, and at Christmas, I really, really enjoy shopping for the grandkids and for my nieces and nephew. Amelia, who likes to send me long texts followed by a string of emoticons, loved her emoticon message bead kit. 😀😂😉

Matthew's new Star Wars Legos certainly made him smile.

Cari's favorite gift was clearly the new ukulele she received from her parents, and Alex and I knew she'd never guess …

What our biggest gift to her was this year. (If you guessed a sparkly new lamp for her new bedroom, you win!)

And I didn't take a picture of Madison opening anything, but her favorite part of the day was clearly spending time with her gentleman caller, Dylan.

Here's my sister, Rhonda, and me with Daddy, and then a better picture of Daddy. (Rhonda, who has always been thin, thought the other pictures made her look fat. As if!)

And here are Amelia and Matthew with their gingerbread house. Matthew was proud of the handle and doorbell on the house but said it looked like "a candy tornado" had come through. Ha! I hope you all had a great time celebrating with your own family and friends!