Boy do I love me some Christmas

This post is going to start with a request. The wonderful Jenna, that so many of you know from the blogging community has made a simple request.

The background:
Five for Fighting (the music group) is using their voice in a
wonderfully altruistic way by organizing http://www.whatkindofworlddoyouwant.com ,
a project aimed at empowering people through the technology of
videography. Regular people, like you and me are creating videos to
help share their experiences with others. These people are putting themselves out there for the world to see in the hopes that others will learn and appreciate their struggles with autism.

Jenna's friend has a son that was recently diagnosis with Autism. Her friend has created a video that is beautiful and touching. I started crying pretty quickly after it started. But more importantly, if you have 3 minutes: View their video, Ordinary Miracles. Each time their video is viewed (and all the videos for that matter), a donation is made to their charity of choice ~ in this case, Autism Speaks.

It's such a short easy wasy to help a very worthwhile cause. Thanks!

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Now, on to Christmas. Fun times over here at the Dunn house. First of all, our cookie baking extravaganza went off swimmingly! We made a ton of good stuff, had fun, and the kids were all good! So yeah for us for continuing the tradition.

Christmas Eve we went down to see Eric's family during the day. We were able to exchange gifts with most of his family and spend some time since we weren't going to see them Christmas Day. Hailey was dressed to the nines but Jake was a bit more casual. He was wearing a onesie given to him by the ever inappropriate Aunt Chrissy! It says "You Should See My Package!" LOVE IT!


We had a nice time visiting with Eric's family and got lots of nice gifts. But the kids didn't nap great during the day, so by the time we left, we really needed to get them home and to bed. We were planning on stopping by my cousins on the way home, but the kids and time did not allow it, so we just headed home. We ended up ordering chinese food, and Eric and I cuddled and watched Scrooge. It's one of our favorite Christmas movies. I love all the music. It was nice to have a lazy night on Christmas Eve. Usually we are so busy so it was nice to be able to just be low key while the babes slept.

Christmas morning started bright and early. The twins woke us up about 630am and we changed them into their ADORABLE christmas pjs, courtesy of Brian and Jess (thanks!). We fed them, and then propped them on the floor to open all their gifts. They could care less about the gifts, mostly they just wanted to eat the paper. All was good until Jake was sitting up and promptly just fell straight back banging his head on the floor. He screamed bloody murder! We have carpet on our hard wood, but it's pretty thin and flimsy. Poor little guy. But he was ok in a few minutes. Here's a pic of them getting ready to open gifts.


And here is a picture of them after they opened all their gifts.


And of course, playing with the wrapping paper!


We had a nice Christmas morning, but holy crap! do we need to get a lot of stuff together to get out of the house for the day. We went to my parents house for Christmas, and at first it was just us, my sis and her husband and my brother. We all opened our gifts. It was beyond overwhelming. I think the first half hour was just me opening gifts for the twins. My sister and bro-in-law and my brother gave us some much needed gift cards for Babies R Us, as well as really cute toys.

My parents, as always, went WAY above and beyond. She bought a ridiculous amount of clothes for the kids, which they REALLY need, and then so many toys! I swear, these kids are not going to want for anything! I am always overwhelmed by their generosity. I think my mom has been waiting so long to be a Grandma just so she can spoil these children rotten. And really, who am I to stop her? We also got a lot of really nice gifts for Eric and myself.

I loved giving lots of gifts to my family. I gave a lot of baby related gifts. I made everyone in my family a calendar of the twins and tried to personalize them to the recipient. I think they came out really nice. Plus I got ornaments made with the kids heads on them. Then I gave my sister an Aunt Brag Book, and put some pics in it for her. My dad really needed a new wallet, so I got him one and loaded it up with wallet size baby pics. He loved it! I was able to take advantage of where I work, and get my mom beautiful earrings and necklace that came in the lovely blue box. Really, who doesn't love getting a gift in the blue box?? I even bought myself a Christmas gift from work. Because I deserve it!

After we opened gifts with my family, my mom's cousin and his wife came over, and their son with his 2 sons. Also our close family friends Deanna, Cherisse and her husband Scott joined us. Then our friends Jan and Joan came for dessert. We had a lovely day, and ate way too much food. My mom is Italian, and cooks like no ones business. We had dips/chips/crackers/cheese etc when we got there. Then we had antipasto/shrimp/mozz and peppers/ etc for the first course. Second course was manicotti, meatballs, sausage and pork. And then the last course was Lamb with tomatos and potatoes with broccoli casserole. I NEVER make it to the last course. I fill up on all the italian food and I'm done. Then we must have had 15 different desserts. I endulged in Creme de Menthe pie, pumpkin cheesecake and a Red Velvet cupcake.

The kids were so good. They didn't get good naps, they slept here and there in Aunt chrissy and Grandma's arms, but that was it. And they remained in such good spirits I was so proud of them! But around 730pm a breakdown started to occur, so we had to leave.

It was really a lovely Christmas. The only downside was this morning, when I realized that we took NO pics of Christmas at the parents. Well, Eric took a couple when we were opening gifts, and he took a lot of video, but I was sad to have not taken many pics of the babies with my family. Oh well, we've got plenty of time in the future for more pics! Here's a couple of cute one!




It was a lovely Christmas. Today is my least favorite day of the year, because it is the furthest one from Christmas. I hope that everyone had a wonderful wonderful holiday. I need a nap now!

Enjoy,
Erica