Christmas Part One ...

Since we don't live near our families, we have traditionally had three Christmases each year. First we celebrate with my mom and sisters. Then, we have Christmas morning at our house. And finally, a day or two after Christmas, we open gifts for a third time with J's family. Oh, and somewhere in there we take our annual week-long Christmas vacation (we take our kids on vacation in lieu of gifts).

As you can imagine, this makes for a very hectic December.

This past weekend was Christmas Part One for us. Everyone met at my little sister's house for a weekend full of food, gifts, baking, laughing and crazy Christmas shirts. The festivities began with dinner out. Afterward, we decorated the Christmas tree.

And posed for pictures (some not as successful as others).

In the morning, we opened gifts (which I failed to take a single picture of) and started our baking marathon,


while wearing these shirts (Note: that is Dizzle's finger in the picture).


And over the course of 24 hours, my hair went from this,


to this,


and finally, to this.


Yeah, no one said we were normal.