feeling festive.. part three

It's Christmas Eve, and we've been up cooking since 7:30am ET. 

And it's been raining all night.

And there's flooding.. and thunder.. and the weatherman is telling everyone to stay home.

So instead of feeding six over at my mom's house for Christmas Eve, our meal fed just the two of us..

I insisted we sit at the table.  Yay Christmas dishes!

Always save room for dessert!

And maybe have a coke or two on the back porch, while we watch our mini rapids flowing in the back yard, as it continues to rain.  And rain.  And rain!

As the night went on, we got a sweet gift from family and shared some leftovers with them.  It's hard to see, but in the center of this picture is the Swarovski ornament they gave us to commemorate our new home and the year we got married (2013).

The next day was Christmas! And it was time to head over to my in-laws for lunch and exchanging gifts.  I wasn't in charge of much of the cooking this go round, so I just made a quick corn dip for us to munch on while lunch was being prepared and a sweet smore's cake for dessert.

It's become a bit of a tradition with my sister and brother in-law to do interesting gifts.  In my family when I was younger, my Dad would always do "prank" gifts -  wrapping gifts in duct tape, adding a can of beans to the present, or random car parts.  We even used to do scavenger hunts.

I've been nice to my in-laws so far.. maybe a few box within a box within a box, or a pinata with money inside, or a ball of crepe paper with money.. well, this year, my sister-in-law owned it..

I present to you, twenty five individually wrapped dollar bills.  I loved it!  And the paper she used was so pretty!

After an afternoon of festivities, the Man and I packed up and headed home.  It was nice to spend some time just the two of us.  Overall, I would say it's been a pretty good start to celebrating the Holidays in our new home.

Here's to many more years of Christmas Cheer!