"Santa Claus Is Coming To Town" Melanie's First Christmas, Talking To My Missionary Brothers, And Lots Of Family Time!

I absolutely love the holidays. This year particularly was a special one for multiple reasons. Throughout this post, you will understand why.

Dallan's parents got Melanie an ornament to put on their Christmas tree.
It was quite cute.



Melanie's Uncle Justin (Dallan's brother), came home from St. George for Christmas. It was so fun to have him around and Melanie absolutely adores him. He's her buddy.

Melanie had to put up the ornament that she got from Dallan's parents. She had fun doing that. She felt like a big girl by putting something pretty on the tree.
Check out that hair! LOVE IT!

One of the traditions we have is to build gingerbread houses. We usually get together with Dallan's mom's side of the family and do it, but this year we did it as an immediate family. It was nice and loads of fun. This year I went all out with my gingerbread house. I hardly left any room on the plate!

My finished product!

After the decorating, OF COURSE we have to take pictures of us with our masterpieces.

Along with the gingerbread houses we decorated sugar cookies. The Squish even helped out with that. It was so cute to watch her and Dallan work together to cut out the cookies.
She loves her Daddy.... I love her Daddy too.

Ignore my overly excited face in this first picture. I just LOVE Christmas! Hahaha!

Family picture time!
Love my cute little family so much!

This is just some of the buildings for the Christmas Village. Dallan's Grandpa Ebert collected them throughout the years before he passed away. He loved putting up his villages throughout his house. I never had the opportunity to meet Grandpa, but I hear he literally had hundreds of figurines for his magnificent villages. When he passed, all of his children and grandchildren got to keep some in remembrance of him. We always put our little village up during Christmas time in honor of our Grandpa Ebert.
We love you Grandpa!

This nativity is what Christmas is really about.
Celebrating the birth of our dear Savior, Jesus Christ.

Dallan's mom's side of the family all got together for our annual Christmas party. There's nothing like good food, family time, musical entertainment, and white elephant exchanges!

Every year we also go over to our Grandma and Grandpa Hope's house to decorate ornaments and make yummy sweets.

Melanie LOVED decorating the ornaments! Look at that sweet face. I had fun doing it with her too.

Then she made cookies once again with her daddy.
The picture on the bottom right is her finished product. Hahaha!
The picture on the bottom left cracks me up. She looks so concentrated.
"I must get this cookie perfect!"

Me and my sweet baby girl.

There is nothing like looking into her adorable innocent eyes.

It was then Dallan's dad's side for a Christmas family get-together.
Every year on Christmas Eve, we gather together at our Uncle Monty's house for a prime rib dinner. Then for dessert we always have eclairs.
Mmm Mmm Good!
Then we play games and just enjoy the company.

We had these little poppers and inside of each one was a little surprise.
We got paper crowns!
Dallan's dad is a goof..... I've taught him well. ;) Hahaha!
For once, someone else is pulling a funny face in the picture... NOT ME!
It's a Christmas Miracle!!!!

Squish got a crown too. She was also getting really tired. It was WAY passed her bedtime.

Then Christmas morning came! Melanie was amazed at how beautiful the tree looked with all the gifts under it from Santa!
For her first Christmas, she sure was excited!

She fell asleep in the car playing with her new toy.
How cute!

We headed over to the Hope's for present opening and a mighty tasty breakfast.

Melanie's Uncle Justin and soon-to-be Aunt Lacy, got her the most huge stuffed animal I have ever seen!
At first she wasn't too sure about it, but now she absolutely LOVES it. She even gives it hugs and kisses.

After breakfast we headed over to my parents' house for presents and to talk to my brothers Ricky and Ben through Skype! Baby girl loved her gifts from her Nana and Tata. Can you tell?
The bottom picture says it all!
It's as if she is saying, "Thank you, thank you, thank you!"

My brothers ended up Skyping us at THE SAME TIME! They are both serving LDS Missions and it was great to be together as a "whole family" again. Even if it was just for an hour or so.
It sure was a tender mercy from our Heavenly Father.

We were even able to get a picture of our awesome family! Too bad Ben's head is cut off a little. Oh well, at least we are all in it. Hahaha! :) 

After talking to my brothers, we hurried over to Grandma and Grandpa Hope's house for a gift exchange.
It was fun helping Melanie open her presents! She did pretty good for an 11 month old!

We then visited Dallan's Grandma Ebert then headed to my parents' house once again for an amazing Christmas dinner!

The holidays are a special time to be with family and to appreciate the things that matter most. I'm glad that I got to celebrate the birth of our Savior with the people I love. I wouldn't have it any other way.

I have so many things to be thankful for. My wonderful and sweet husband, having family that live so close, my precious baby girl, and especially for my Savior Jesus Christ. Without him, none of this would be possible.

Melanie's first birthday coming soon to a blog near you!