Meet the Grosser Family: A Holly Jolly Christmas...

We had a fantastic holiday and I have totally meant to share, but I have been really busy being in a vegetative state. I feel like a zombie and I can't get a thing done.

I did all handmade gifts and spent like a  solid week in the kitchen.  I didn't even get to share all my recipes. 

ah, maybe someday...

Here's some pix though!

I made peanut butter fudge, toffee {3 batches}, White and dark chocolate Oreo truffles, chocolate dipped PB Ritz, No-bake cookies, chocolate chip cookies, sugar cookies, cookie jars, lavender scented bath salts, and carrot cake with cream cheese frosting in mason jars. Whew I am a busy bee!

As you can see, I have a new obsession with mason jars.

So, that's that and we are moving on.

So here I am FINALLY getting to share all the fun we had.

Warning though it is a long post...

First off, let me just say how so very grateful I am to have such wonderful family and friends. Although it has been a rough year for many of us, I really felt like the holiday spirit was greater than it has ever been.

So here's a little background info on some of our family traditions...

The first year we were married and went to 5 places in 2 days over Christmas and spent the majority of our time in the car. Not cool. So we came up with a solution. We rotate our Holidays. We go one place for Thanksgiving, one place for Xmas eve, and one for Christmas day. We try to squeeze a little time in for the family that had Thanksgiving in sometime around the Xmas holiday too. I t has always worked well for us and then we get to spend some quality time with everyone.

Since we spent Thanksgiving with the Grossers, we decided to pop in and sing them some Carols Xmas eve morning. It was really fun and we had my Father-in-law smiling from ear to ear and my Mom-in-Law in tears. I am posing no pix of the two of them {as per her request}. It was a pop in after all and she was still in her jammies.

Here's one of us though. :)

This year we spent Christmas Eve at my Mom's house with the whole fam. 26 of us to be exact. Our tradition here starts with a wonderful feast. Next we sang some carols. Aaron took the lead on this one. We sang Silent Night and he even had that little shake in his voice that vocalists do. It was adorable!

"Ha-ay"

We also take a moment to remember what Christmas is really all about. This year my hip Grandpa had the whole bible downloaded into his DROID and read to us from there. How cool is that? My mom also read a a sweet story to the crew.

Next on the tradition list  is opening one present each.  It is always a new pair of PJ's and  sometimes slippers too.  Almost everyone then proceeds to change into  them to go home and wait for Santa to arrive.

My cousins got some fabulous snuggie knock offs.

So after all the hoopla there, we went home and did the usual night before Christmas stuff and got very little sleep. We were all a bit groggy when the kids woke up at 9 the next morning. Ya that's right I said nine. Be jealous.

They perked right up when they remembered we had a visitor while they were in dreamland.

Oh BTW, we started a new gift tradition a few years back because of all the "stuff" the kids end up getting, they get one gift from Santa, one from their sibling, and one from Mom and Dad. We also get a family gift from Santa and of course some goodies in our stocking, but the boys are always satisfied and happy. We really are trying to teach them more about giving and to not be so materialistic in this world we live in, but that is a whole other post here...I'm on a tangent. {as Aaron says}

Aaron bought me this beautiful pink glitter heart necklace from Santa's shop at school. He was so proud and told me that he was giving me this beautiful heart because his heart is so full of love for me. awww...

That kid has my heart for sure!

Back to our traditions... On Christmas morning we always have eggs Benedict and sometimes we have family over and sometimes we go at it alone. This year we were on our own and it was kinda nice. After breakfast and gifts, Jeremy and I proceeded to putt together toys. The boys are really into LEGO'S and PLAYMOBIL. Both of which need some major assembly. Ty's LEGO set has 1700+ pieces alone!!! I wanted to superglue it together so we never have to do it again, but apparently that's half of the fun. So anyway, we worked at this for the majority of the morning while listening to Christmas music and sipping our much need coffee.

Later that afternoon, we went to Christmas dinner at my Dad's house. We had a great time there. We watched the Disneyland parade had yet another fabulous feast and opened more gifts. By the end of the night we were all sprawled around the house almost physically unable to move. Oh wait, that was just me...

Grandma Donna and Aaron

My sister Amy and her boyfriend James

The boys and their pile of loot

Here's my Dad handing out a different kind of loot. ;) We all felt so bad for him he got a case of laryngitis and couldn't talk at all. We need a family dinner do over!