christmas in Bossier

Last weekend we celebrated christmas with my mom's side of the family. The bryant/ kammerdiener clan in bossier city, LA. Due to the craziness and conflicting schedules of the holidays we always plan to celebrate on a different day or even weekend than christmas so that everyone can attend everything. PERFECT! We left early saturday morning and ben, aiden, and I rode with my parents. Aiden did really well in the car. He watched his DVD player and played/ dropped everything I gave to him. Not to mention holding on to his spoons for dear life. That will be what we remember from this christmas, aiden with spoons in his hands and don't you dare try to take them from him!

We got to Bossier in time for lunch and had an incredible feast full of yummy homemade traditionals like corn, green beans, salad, dressing, rolls, turkey, cranberries, fruit salad...all of it oh so good! After the meal we lounged for a bit before starting to open presents. The way we do gift exchange is that everyone buys for the little children or rather the unmarried/ still in school aged children. We also buy for papaw and eloise of course! Everyone else bring a "white elephant, dirty santa, chinese gift exchange (whatever you want to call the game) game gift. Some of the gifts are really great and get stolen a lot. Other gifts end up not really matching the person that gets them! That's the fun though! After the christmas gift exchange game we went down to debbie and van's house for "dessert". We really were going to debbie's to celebrate my uncle tommy's 50th birthday this year! We had a cake for him and sang and then played a trivia game about "who knows tom best". It was a ton of fun and I was actually one of the people who knew the most?!?! Lots of the questions were yes or no, true/ false type so I'm thinking it's just more that I am a lucky guesser. After all the fun and playing we had round 2 of the "eat-athon" by heating up left overs and snacking on little appetizer things mom made. Then the girls and aiden went driving around looking at some of the spectacular christmas lights in the neighborhoods and the guys crowded around a radio/ computer to try and listen to the cowboys game that wasn't being aired on network TV in Bossier. The lights were spectacular and thank goodness aiden fell asleep because he hadn't napped the whole LONG day and I was nervous we were going to be in for a long night. After aiden was in bed some of us girls curled up on debbie's couches next to the fire and watched movies. Can you get any more perfect than that? I think not.

Sunday morning we got up and went to debbie and van's church and then out to eat at picadilly cafeteria. Then the girls went on a "shopping" expedition to the boardwalk. The guys decided to bail out on the trip and opted to stay at the house and watch more football. Aiden stayed with ben and I was grateful for that because it would have been hard to manage aiden at the boardwalk. We had a great and girly time, walking around all the shops and riding on the trolley that goes down the main strip. We stopped off for refreshments at sonic inside the bass pro shop?? Go figure! And brittany and brandi even got the chance to see and tell santa what they waned for christmas. Proving you are never too old for santa!

It was a really great trip and although aiden did have a couple of meltdowns it wasn't anything dramatic and definitely none that were not manageable. Maybe we have gotten a better handle on this now or maybe it was that we were with my family so I didn't feel quite as pressured when he would start to act out. I don't know but this was definitely a better trip than the last one! On the drive back home we stopped and went through "santa land" in tyler TX. It is this drive through amazing field just full of 100's of thousands of lights and displays to music. We thought aiden would enjoy it and we haven't been through it in several years. It was around a 2 hour excursion but it was worth it and I do think aiden enjoyed it. The lights were beautiful. By the time we got home though he was WORN out and very ready to be out of the car and out of his seat. What a great trip!

The "adult" table eating the traditional christmas meal

The "kids" table

Cutest little boy ever doing "cheese" for the camera and eating very good with his spoon!

Papaw modeling his new sweater as the gifts are being opened

My aunt debbie made these ADORABLE aprons for aiden. I LOVE them! One says "gigi's helper" for when they make cookies next

and the one I am modeling has the cowboys fabric on it for when he wants to grill out with daddy. He didn't really want to try them on so that's why I did this one...

Opening his gift from the Bryant family. It makes lots of noise and never stops! We can just not thank you guys enough for adding this to our home! ;)

The boys were tossing around the ball and playing "keep away" from aiden. He thought it was funny.

NOPE he got the ball and poppy is going to protect him so blake can't get it. Too cute.

Aiden kept backing up and trying to sit on blake's lap. So sweet!

Aiden would let you know when he wanted his picture taken cause he'd go sit somewhere and go "CHEESE"!!! LOVE IT!!!!

Waiting for the chinese gift exchange game to start. Brandi, brittany and dad.

Tommy and van

Yay tommy got some movie passes! Good gift!

LOL!!!! Dad and ben ended up with identical glass christmas trees! Just what they've always wanted! They accepted them on behalf of the academy!

eloise and I waiting for the birthday boy to arrive so we can get party #2 started!

Yay! 50 and fabulous! Happy birthday tom!

Aiden eating a piece of cake. Oh how he loves cake!

Sitting in the floor playing the "who knows tommy best" game. This is deb's remodeled living room which is just PERFECT for entertaining. So much room and so many comfortable seating places. Love it.

Aiden found a comfortable seat just his size! This little rocker was my grandmother's when she was a little girl.

Taking a little christmas nap after a fun but tiring day!

Sunday morning aiden is ready for church but first he wants his picture taken with this santa.

The hutches fam in front of the christmas tree ready for church.

Mom and dad

Aiden with santa again...oh wait no that's dad in a red suede vest!

The bryant family

The girls on the trolley at the boardwalk

The girls having refreshments at the sonic inside bass pro.

Never too old for santa!

Beautiful girls on the boardwalk

And finally this is deb's living room with the fire and the tree! Oh so perfect! This just says christmas to me! Hope everyone had a wonderful holiday filled with all the people they love.

****I am going to TRY to get the rest of my christmas pictures/ posts up today before we leave for santa fe tomorrow but be patient with me! It's a lot of work going through all these pictures!******