Canadian Christmas 2013: Part Two

This post is all about Christmas! The reason for the season. We get together as families to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ. I am so grateful for eternal families. I think that is what I am most grateful for to my Savior: the possibility to be with my family forever.

Christmas Eve we get together with my Dad's side of the family. We have a big turkey dinner, open presents, eat pie, and have a great time being together.

Hunter with his Great Grandma Hunter :)

Dad reading us T'was the Night Before Christmas by the tree. Christmas Eve tradition.

 In our house Christmas morning was not allowed to start before 8 am. If we woke up before then, we had to wait in our rooms, but we couldn't wake up Mom and Dad before 8 am. The rule still stands today! (My sweet mother is not a morning person in an form of the term. Love you Mom!) At 8 am we would all congregate in Mom and Dad's room, then line up youngest to oldest while my dad turned on the Christmas lights downstairs. Once he got back upstairs we would march downstairs and see what Santa left us!

Gathering in Mom and Dad's room :)

 Santa brought Hunter a Tonka truck!

 Candy canes for breakfast? Sure, why not. :)

Opening presents was so fun with this little man. Christmas really is so magical with little ones!

 Reading the Frosty the Snowman book with Abby that Santa left for our whole family.

He also loves to "read" things to us all the time, all by himself.

 Sharing some breakfast :)

 After we are done opening presents we eat fruit bread toast and oranges for breakfast. We enjoy all our presents for a while and then head over to my grandparents' house (my mom's parents) for Christmas dinner and more presents.

My dad rented this 15 passenger van so we could all fit in one vehicle. It was so awesome! Party van! However, it was not so easy to push out when it gets stuck ;) This is right in front of my grandparents' house. There was a thick sheet of ice underneath the snow so it was pretty impossible to get any traction. Not to mention we were parked facing uphill. We were all outside pushing the van and finally got it out after about 20-30 minutes! Haha. Memories :)

Hunter with Great Grandma and Great Grandpa Blaxall!

Our family on Christmas day 2013 :)

One more post of Canadian fun coming up!

Canadian Christmas 2013: Part One

Our trip to Canada for Christmas was, in a word, awesome! We had so much fun being with family and doing lots of fun things. So many fun things that it will take a few blog posts to cover everything :) 

We had the best weather while we were up there! It was amazing. There was a ton of snow to play in and do fun outdoor activities and the temperatures were right around freezing or above! Perfect for playing in the snow :)

My parents' backyard was completely untouched when we got there, so we quickly changed that ;) This little boy loves to play in the snow. Absolutely loves it. He does the best belly-angels ever. Normal snow angels are cool, too ;) He loves snowballs. He learned how to throw the snow in the air and make it "snow" and also how to catch snowflakes on his tongue (so adorable!) He makes it so much more fun to play in the snow :)

One night we built snowmen in the dark and it was a blast!

We built Hunter a snowman just his size and he thought it was hilarious. He kept laughing and pointing at it.

Abby also had her own little snowman to give some lovin'

His cuteness kills me!

The whole snowman building/snowball fighting crew

I think my favorite activity to do at home is go ice skating. There is a lake down the street from my parents' house that freezes over, but this year the lake wasn't frozen thick enough to ice skate on. Fortunately there is a small upper rink that freezes so everyone can skate on it. Hunter did really well with his little bob skates, but quickly got frustrated that he couldn't take off running. After we took the skates off he had a blast running around on the ice, and purposely crashing on his bum and belly.

 

 I love my family :)

I especially love this guy.

Sledding was another favorite outdoor activity! Hunter loved getting pulled around in this little sled for a while. If you stopped he would point and say "vvvvrrr" for you to keep going :)

He also loved going down the hill on the bigger sleds. As soon as he got to the bottom we asked if he wanted to go down again and he promptly sat right back down in the sled! He couldn't get enough.

As soon as he discovered the GT Snowracers it was all over. He could "drive" those ones! He loved being pulled around on those and going down the hill, too.

We completely wore him out. Passed out on the way home :)

More Canadian fun to come!