Whew......What a Christmas!!!

We had an amazing Christmas this year! The fact that Daniel was home from Afghanistan was like a cherry on top!! We started the festivities on the Friday before Christmas with Claire's daycare Christmas party and ended the holiday with a late flight home Sunday night from Texas. I'll warn you now that this is a very long blog but I wanted to document the entire holiday.....especially since it was Claire's first. So, I will start with day one.

Friday, Dec. 19th:
At Claire's daycare the kids drew names for a gift exchange. Claire drew Blake and gave him a batman figurine set and Brendon drew Claire and gave her a Leap Frog turtle. Lisa also gave Claire a Little People train set. She loved all of her toys. After the party we were off to Louisville to celebrate Christmas with Daniel's family.



Wendy and Morgan.

From left: Elizabeth, Blake and Cheyenne

Saturday, Dec. 20th:

We stayed at Daniel's cousin's house because they have a little boy about three months older than Claire and had all of the necessary baby gear. We got up Saturday morning and took Claire, along with Grandpa Hubert, to see Santa Claus at the mall. She was a little unsure of the whole experience but she didn't cry so I guess it could have been worse. After that we all went to dinner and then went back to Grandpa's house to do a gift exchange.


Great Grandma Ruth and Claire

Daddy, Claire and Grandpa

Uncle PJ, Daddy and Claire

Sunday, Dec. 21st:

Daniel's Aunts rented out the Club House in their condominium community to host a Christmas party for the family. There was all kinds of food and drinks and more gift giving. We had a really good time and it was nice to see everyone. It was especially nice for Daniel to catch up with everyone after being gone for the last year. The kids had a blast and Claire was completely worn out by the time we left.



Claire and Rayden had so much fun together. We stayed at Rayden's house so they got to play with each other all weekend.


Daniel's cousin Chris and Rayden




Daniel's cousin Paula's son Matthew with Claire.

Daniel's cousin Stacie's daughter Riley giving Claire the choke hold :)

The Cranmer Family (Stacie is Daniel's cousin).

Dalton (Rayden's brother) holding Claire. He was such a big help with her.


Monday, Dec. 22nd:

We woke up early and got on the road home to Clarksville. It was absolutely frigid outside. When we got in the truck the temperature read 4 degrees and it only rose to 8 degrees by the time we arrived in Clarksville. We immediately started unpacking and doing laundry when we got home in order to get re-packed and head to the airport to fly to Texas that night. About 3 o'clock we discovered that the master bathroom toilet wasn't refilling with water after it flushed. Come to find out, the pipe was frozen. So, in the middle of rushing to get packed and to the airport, Daniel had to shut off the main water supply and drain all of the pipes so that we didn't come home to a flooded house due to a busted pipe. We made it to the airport in time for our flight and arrived in Houston a little after 10 pm.

Tuesday, Dec. 23rd:

Daniel and I went on a shopping date! My mom watched Claire and we headed to Pearland to do some Christmas shopping. It was really nice to have some time to ourselves. We got all of our Christmas shopping done and had dinner at the Bass Pro Shop. Yes, I know that sounds a bit redneck but we were there doing some shopping and didn't want to fight the traffic to go to a different restaurant. As it turns out, the food was great! We both had a Mahi Mahi fish sandwich and loved it. When we got home, my Aunt Linda and sister Juli and her family were there. We visited with them and then called it night. We new the next day would be very busy.

Wednesday, Dec. 24th:

Haley, Jason, and Sofi arrived and my cousin Scott also came in. As a new family tradition, all of the adults drew names for a Christmas Eve Pajama Exchange. We drew names around noon and then everyone headed out to shop for PJ's. When we got home we exchanged presents and everyone put on their new PJ's. Also, mom and Aunt Linda put together a very yummy food spread and suprised Daniel with a small "Welcome Home" celebration complete with a champagne toast.

Claire loved the shiny gold wrapping paper that Juli wrapped her gifts in.

Logan hanging out in the moses basket.

Welcome Home/Christmas Eve

Fallon and Brandon. Check out all those stockings.

Fallon's new PJ's.

Claire is typically a very good tempered baby. She rarely gets too upset but I think she was suffering from stimulation overload! Poor baby!


Look at that new tooth.





Eating a puff! Look at those little rose bud lips.

Daniel and Clinton posing for the JC Penny catalog.

Aunt Linda gave all of the babies Christmas PJ's. Thank you Aunt Linda!!

Daniel looking hot in his new PJ's!!


G-Paw downloaded a bunch of Sesame Street videos and Tanner and Claire loved sitting in his lap to watch them on the computer.

Daddy (Santa) stuffing Claire Bear's stocking.

Mommy (Mrs. Claus) helping!

Thursday, Dec. 25th:

Christmas morning we all woke up and went into the living to find that Santa Claus (Gigi and G-Paw) had, indeed, paid a visit. Not only did he pay a visit but he went above and beyond this year. He hand colored a poster for every family to designate whose pile of stuff was whose. Among other stuff, he left the Hubert family Guitar Hero!! After we opened all of the presents everyone got dressed for the first annual Ugly Christmas Sweater Contest. I have to say, there were some pretty ugly entries!!! We all voted and Jason won the grand prize which happened to be an ugly knit hat to go with his ugly sweater vest. It was a lot of fun. However, it was a whopping 80 degrees outside so we didn't wear our sweaters the entire day. We also did a "Dirty Santa" gift exchange that afternoon. The girls in the family brought a board game and the boys brought a DVD. Everyone drew numbers and got to pick from the pile or take from someone else. In an ending that couldn't have been planned better, Clinton ended up picking last and opened the last remaining present................his favorite DVD...................Brokeback Mountain. It was hilarious!!! We had an early evening dinner of Turkey, Ham and all the fixins' and ended the evening with a Guitar Hero tournament! What a great day!

Still trying to wake up :)


Gigi and G-Paw's stack of goodies from Santa.







Claire absolutely loved her Bear puppet that Santa left.

She also got a ton of Leap Frog toys and Baby Einstein books.


Tanner tried out her new monkey bandaids that Santa left.

We borrowed the sweater that Daniel wore from my friend Holly. She found it at her parent's house for us. Thanks Holly.........Daniel got quite a few votes!

Nice vest Jason!

Check out that dress..........wow!!

And the winner is.............

Here is one of two tables we had to set up for our big family.

Table #2

And the guitar hero tournament begins!!!

Friday, Dec. 26th:
We woke up early and got dressed for a family picture. Mr. Roznovsky, the same person who took our wedding pictures, met us at the local college to take our family pictures. I will post some when I get them. They turned out really nice. After pictures we all got packed up and headed to the hill country. Our first stop was Juli and Clinton's house in Pleasanton, TX. Juli fed us homemade lasagna and we just hung out and played games after the kids went to sleep.

Claire practiced her driving skills in G-Paws lap while we waited for Taco Bell food.

Aunt Linda made Claire a newspaper hat.

Tanner helping change Sofi's diaper.

Uncle Clinton reading a book to Tanner and Claire

Tanner helping Gigi make breakfast.

Saturday, Dec. 27th:

We headed to Haley and Jason's house around noon. Everyone was so exhausted that we just layed around the house, ate, and played games. Haley and Jason made a brisket and sides for dinner. It was all very good. Haley and Jason just bought some land nearby in New Braunfels so they took us out to see it and that was pretty much the excitement for the day. It was an early night for most of us and I think we were all so tired that no one took pictures.

Sunday, Dec. 28th:

Sunday we woke up and headed back to my parent's house in Lake Jackson to pack up and head to the airport. We got home around 11 pm and, with our fingers crossed, Daniel turned the water back on and luckily we didn't have a busted pipe.............no leaks!!!! Yippy!!! I had to work yesterday and today but I'm off starting tomorrow for a week and a half. It will be nice to be at home, with my family complete, doing absolutely nothing :)