CHRISTMAS TRADITIONS

I love Christmas time and I love being with my family and doing fun things together. Every year we go together as a family and pick out a Christmas tree. This has alway's been something that has been fun and something we have looked forward too. Last year however our 10 ft Christmas tree fell over two times breaking all the ornaments and leaving a water stain on the carpet. So, this year we were so close to just forgetting the whole thing and just buying a fake tree. But because we love the smell and the look of a real tree, we decided to give it another shot. I am so glad we did because we found the perfect tree and it hasn't given us any stress so far.

St Nick came on the 5th of December. This is a German tradition started with Toby's dad's family. Brooklyn was so excited to get her treat in her shoes. The only sad thing was she couldn't eat it yet because her tongue was still pretty bad. She carried her treat around with her all day though and kept telling me that her friend Nick came and gave her a treat.

Christmas decorating has alway's been something that I have loved doing with my family. I remember every year my parents would turn on Christmas music and we would all decorate the tree together (or whoever could be there). This is something we look forward to doing now with our little family. I wasn't really in the Christmas decorating mood this year and it took me a little while to get motivated to do it. Brooklyn was a big help this year and kept reminding me that we needed to decorate. Then when we finally did it she was VERY helpful and she loved every minute of it. She is still asking me if there is anything else to decorate.

I love traditions it is so fun to see the excitement in Brooklyn's face as she realizes what a special holiday this is. Nikell is still to young to get it but gets excited because she see's that Brooklyn is that way.

Another thing Toby and I love to do is get ornaments from different places when we are on vacation or traveling. It is so fun decorating the tree and being reminded of all the fun places we have visited over the years.

This ornament we got in 2004, we went to Europe for our 1 year wedding anniversary with our friends Erik and Brandi. It was such a fun trip and we got this ornament in one of my favorite places while we were there, Salzburg, Austria.
We got this ornament in Santa Cruz when we were there a couple of years ago with Ryan and Misty.
This one is from our awesome girls trip to Santa barbara to see Jack Johnson in concert.

These are just a few of the many we have collected over the years.

Toby is still planning on putting lights on our palm trees but this is our house so far.
What are some of your Christmas traditions??