Christmas at Home

Our Christmas at home was FILLED to the brim with merriment, happy times with loved ones, and lots of delicious treats- just as you would hope your holidays would be!

On our first day home we took all the cousins to visit Santa… as you can see, there were mixed emotions about the meeting!

Afterwards we enjoyed the Albaugh Christmas celebration. It was a wonderful evening, and we had such a great time catching up with family.Santa dropped in for a visit that evening as well! Wavy and Mia were much more comfortable with him from a distance.Isla enjoying berries and her new high chair at Nana J’s.

Cookie baking!

Zoolights and dinner with her newest buddy, Piper! Making gingerbread houses with Nana Sandy.Lots of cousin snuggles!Our annual prawns and champagne night with the McD’s. We spent Christmas Eve day with the McD’s and Boensich Family in Dundee. It was a leisurely afternoon, filled with steaming bowls of soup, tall glasses of bubbly, endless trays of Christmas treats, thoughtful presents, and most importantly, lots of laughter and happy conversation!  Great Grandma DJ gave Isla her first sketch book!I absolutely love these precious moments of Isla bird watching with Uncle Tristan (AKA Cuncle Tre-C). I’m not sure which one of them was having more fun!

The Boenisch’s have a few new family members! Apparently llamas are excellent “guardians” and help keep their flock on sheep safe. Who knew?! Isla had a great time feeding and waving at the llamas.That evening we went back to Mom’s house to continue our Christmas Eve celebration.We had my mom’s amazing spaghetti and meatballs and Isla couldn’t feed herself fast enough! Before long everyone at the table was completely captivated by Isla and her spaghetti.Isla Grace, spaghetti face.We had such a lovely, quiet Christmas morning, and opened gifts with my mom. Isla is now old enough to start helping with the unwrapping and it was so fun to see her excitement as we opened each gift.Later in the morning we drove down to Salem to spend the day celebrating with the Marshall family. We started off with a delicious brunch, followed by Christmas stockings and the first round of presents. We took a break in our gift opening so the little girls could nap and to extend the excitement of Christmas throughout the day. We continued with presents later in the afternoon and finished up the evening with dinner. It was such a relaxing and enjoyable day. Watching all of the cousins run around together was such a treat, and we know next year will be even more exciting when our newest niece or nephew joins the bunch!Apparently a happy “cousins picture” was just not in the cards this Christmas! Ha!

Isla received her first magnadoodle and she loved it! Waverly, already fascinated with cleaning (like her mommy!) tried to wipe away all of Isla’s drawing with a towel. Once she realized that wouldn’t work she went and got her new mop and gave that a shot. Too funny!Princess Momo!Nana and Papa got Isla her first camera! She LOVES it, and it didn’t take her more than a few tries to add “cohmra” to her rapidly growing list of words.I completely forgot to put Isla’s Christmas dress on her during Christmas Eve (doh!), so we brought it out for the evening on Christmas Day. I just love Isla in this little dress!Love this little Christmas elf so much!!!A little airplane fun with Uncle Moises.

The day after Christmas Isla, Nana and I enjoyed our annual girls’ overnight with Robin, Ruth Anne, and now, Madelyn! We are so excited to have three generations of friends now… so much fun lies ahead for us!We then headed west for a few nights to celebrate New Year’s at our cottage. The weather was cold, but the days were bright and clear. Just what our lungs needed after months of Shanghai smog. The evenings were equally lovely, treating us to brilliantly colorful sunsets. We enjoyed every precious moment of our time at the coast.Enjoying our final beach walk of 2014 on New Year’s Eve with Nana and Papa.Robin, Neal and Madeline joined us for New Year’s Day and installed the wonderful downspout that Neal made us for Christmas. We love it!Per tradition, my mom made black-eyed peas (for luck in the new year), rice and coleslaw. This year she made jalapeno cornbread too, and I am addicted. I figure I should be REALLY lucky this year with all that I ate!

We took a break during halftime of the Rose Bowl to take our first beach walk of 2015. It was absolutely stunning out! It is hard to adequately describe the joy we feel in our hearts watching our girls play together on the beach… it’s our ultimate happy place!

Bella, our beach girl. She becomes a pup again the minute her paws hit the sand. I love bringing her here.The sunset was brilliant, once again, and cast the most incredible red glow along the coastline.

Before heading back to Shanghai we had a birthday party for Grauntie. Isla and Uncle Chad had a great time drawing on the magnadoodle… it’s hard to tell who was having more fun!