Christmas at the Cottage

My entire side of the family, including my maternal grandparents, journeyed to Monterey for Christmas. Since we didn't plan to travel with a three week old baby, it was so great that they came to us! Did I mention this was the first time the whole family has been together since 2012? So that was exciting. We sure have changed a lot since then. My sister, brother in law and kids stayed here at the cottage, and everyone else was at the nearby hotel, since the cottage is entirely too small to accommodate everyone. It was pretty crazy when we all gathered for meals and Christmas festivities. 

To be honest with you, I wasn't the best host this go around. My mom and sister totally picked up the slack for cleaning and cooking, and most nights I would retreat to my room early with baby Dominic to get some quiet. That's how my postpartum self handled things haha. Luckily people were understanding. I'm grateful for my family!

Christmas Eve: Our traditional family concert and reading of the Christmas story. This time we added a live nativity with all the babies.

 Joseph ready to go. In the background you can see Mary riding in on her donkey ha!

 Mary and Baby Jesus played their parts perfectly. Can't say the same about Joseph!

 Melanie was one of the angels--thus the bedspread. It was a hastily thrown together production.

 Then we opened our Christmas pajamas. Love these cute babies.

 On Christmas Day we opened gifts and had breakfast.

 Ahhh, the post present mess.

We then went to see the new Star Wars, and luckily Victor had already seen it, because J was an absolute crazy during the movie. I think his movie seeing days are done for a while. We had a good run.

Hope you all had a great Christmas. For us it felt different since Victor and I were used to always traveling for Christmas, and having a brand new baby is always a crazy time, but overall it was great. Nothing like appreciating the Christmas story to a new level like having a tiny newborn in the house. It made it special. He was my Christmas present this year! (literally, because Victor forgot to get me anything! I'm not mad about it I promise ;)