Christmas Eve:
Jaclyn had an AMAZING First Christmas. We decided to start our own traditions this year and host Christmas at our house. On Christmas Eve we did a Taco Night with Grammie, Uncle Jake, Great-Grandma Cox, Great Uncle Ken, and cousins David and Donna from Wisconsin, on their first visit to California! It was a great night! We had everyone open one gift that night. Here's Jaclyn with all the presents under the tree!
Here's Jaclyn after getting to open her Christmas Eve Present from Mommy and Daddy. This was a HOT ITEM when Mommy went Black Friday Shopping. It's a Leap Frog Learning Table that she can pull her self up on and play with all the different buttons. The best thing is that it teaches in both English and Spanish. We think she was pretty happy with it!
Christmas morning, Jaclyn received her present from Grandpa John and Diane first; it was a bouncing horse that she easily figured out how to ride and bounce on. Carmen and Ruben (her daycare providers) have been working with her on dancing and bouncing. When ever you yell "Baila, Baila, Baila" she'll laugh and kind of jump up and down like she's dancing. Here's her bouncing on the horse with no hands!
Here's a cute picture of Jaclyn with Grandma and Auntie Erin. Auntie Erin was very practical with Jaclyn's Gifts (which we totally appreciated), but also wrote a really nice, sentimental message in her card for Jaclyn that I'm keeping for her scrapbook for her to read when she's older. It will definitely prove how much she was loved from the very start! It means a lot to me that Erin has taken such an incredible interest in my daughter!
Jaclyn has also been practicing her Princess Wave at daycare. Carmen and Ruben are definitely making a little Ham out of her. She had perfect timing, showing off her wave while riding her Princess Car from Grandma Boss! This is such a great toy for her to practice walking behind. It moves a little fast for her right now; she takes two or three steps and then it slides out in front of her and she falls. This doesn't stop her for long though, she usually gets right up and tries again. She's definitely determined!
She didn't do too badly opening presents. She was definitely alot more into it than we thought. She would rip off one piece of paper at a time, play with it for a little while, and then hand it to Mommy while saying "Pweez" which Carmen Ruben tell us she does understand, but we're still a little skeptical as to whether or not we can write "Please" down as her first word. Opening presents was an incredibly slow process, but very cute! We took a couple of videos, but there was nothing on them exciting enough to share; it took her close to ten minutes to open up each present and that was a bit much to upload.
Funny story for this one:
Once Jaclyn went down for her nap, John, Chris, and Jake opened their stockings from Grammie, which contained remote-control cars. They spent almost half an hour playing with them in our court and even built a ramp before Chris had to go to work. It was so great to see the brothers getting to "play" together! When everyone's so busy, it's times like these that really matter; John and I both really miss getting to hang out together with them like we used to! 
Grammie also bought her boys tickets to the last RAIDER'S game!
Here's one of my favorite pictures that John took of Jaclyn during her lunch. You can't really tell it's a Christmas picuture, but I think it's probably one of the best!
These are pictures of Jaclyn's big gift from Santa. Uncle Jake put it together for her while she was napping. It's a pretty cool toy, even if it does take up a good portion of our family room!
Finally, here's Jaclyn before opening her last present. If you can't tell, she REALLY loves being the center of attention.
Grammie bought Jaclyn her first "American Girl, Bitty Baby" doll. Jaclyn loves this doll, and the coolest thing for us is we get to see how much she's learned already and how AWARE she is of everything that's said around her. We're pretty sure she tried to say "Baby" when she opened this doll, and since Christmas, we've put it down with all of her other toys and asked her, "Where's your Baby?" Every time, she'll go right to it and pick it up. She's done this correctly over a dozen times, and has encouraged us to test what other vocabulary she understands. So far she for sure knows what her "Baby," "Book," and "Ball" are. We're also pretty sure she understands the word "No," but has also decided that she won't obey it every time. We can't believe how much she understands already. She really is growing up fast!
Here's Jaclyn with Grammie in her Christmas Day outfit. For such an eventful day, you'd never be able to tell by looking at her would you? We hope you enjoyed seeing a "snapshot" of Jaclyn's first Christmas. More importantly, we hope you all had as great a Christmas as we did!
Jaclyn had an AMAZING First Christmas. We decided to start our own traditions this year and host Christmas at our house. On Christmas Eve we did a Taco Night with Grammie, Uncle Jake, Great-Grandma Cox, Great Uncle Ken, and cousins David and Donna from Wisconsin, on their first visit to California! It was a great night! We had everyone open one gift that night. Here's Jaclyn with all the presents under the tree!
Here's Jaclyn after getting to open her Christmas Eve Present from Mommy and Daddy. This was a HOT ITEM when Mommy went Black Friday Shopping. It's a Leap Frog Learning Table that she can pull her self up on and play with all the different buttons. The best thing is that it teaches in both English and Spanish. We think she was pretty happy with it!Christmas Morning:
Grammie came over before everyone else to help Mommy with breakfast. We made biscuits and gravy with bacon, hashbrowns, sausage, cinnamon rolls, and Grandpa Mark's Bacon Explosions. We had a full house that morning with Grammie, Grandpa John and Diane, Great Grandma and Great Grandpa Dinwiddie, Great Grandma Godfrey, Grandpa Mark, Grandma Boss, Auntie Erin, Uncle Chris, Uncle Jake, and Cousins David and Donna, (in that order I think!) We had a great morning with Coffee and Baileys (Thanks Mom!), and we even introduced David and Donna to their first Mimosa.
Mommy got up early in the morning to get a picture of the tree after Santa came. Look at all of the RED presents for Jaclyn from him!
Here's a close-up of one of them!
Christmas morning, Jaclyn received her present from Grandpa John and Diane first; it was a bouncing horse that she easily figured out how to ride and bounce on. Carmen and Ruben (her daycare providers) have been working with her on dancing and bouncing. When ever you yell "Baila, Baila, Baila" she'll laugh and kind of jump up and down like she's dancing. Here's her bouncing on the horse with no hands!Here's a cute picture of Jaclyn with Grandma and Auntie Erin. Auntie Erin was very practical with Jaclyn's Gifts (which we totally appreciated), but also wrote a really nice, sentimental message in her card for Jaclyn that I'm keeping for her scrapbook for her to read when she's older. It will definitely prove how much she was loved from the very start! It means a lot to me that Erin has taken such an incredible interest in my daughter!Jaclyn has also been practicing her Princess Wave at daycare. Carmen and Ruben are definitely making a little Ham out of her. She had perfect timing, showing off her wave while riding her Princess Car from Grandma Boss! This is such a great toy for her to practice walking behind. It moves a little fast for her right now; she takes two or three steps and then it slides out in front of her and she falls. This doesn't stop her for long though, she usually gets right up and tries again. She's definitely determined!She didn't do too badly opening presents. She was definitely alot more into it than we thought. She would rip off one piece of paper at a time, play with it for a little while, and then hand it to Mommy while saying "Pweez" which Carmen Ruben tell us she does understand, but we're still a little skeptical as to whether or not we can write "Please" down as her first word. Opening presents was an incredibly slow process, but very cute! We took a couple of videos, but there was nothing on them exciting enough to share; it took her close to ten minutes to open up each present and that was a bit much to upload.We think Boots got a little jealous with all the attention Jaclyn was getting Christmas Morning.
Uncle Jake and Uncle Chris bought Jaclyn this Rocking Giraffe. Jaclyn absolutely Loves this! She crawls over to it all the time to pet and climb on; it's really soft and the Giraffe giggles whenever she squeezes it's ears, which she's already learned to do.
Funny story for this one: Uncle Jake and Uncle Chris bought Daddy a really nice set of tools to work on his Bronce, BUT before he could have it, they made him put on these footed Bunny Jammies that they some how found in his size. It was hilarious, and we do have pictures, just not that I could post on this blog.
Christmas Day:
Just about everyone went home at noon once Jaclyn had to go down for her nap. Grandpa John and Diane stayed for a little bit until Uncle Chris had to go to work, and then it was just down to Grammie, Uncle Jake, and Cousins David and Donna. We opened all of out presents while Jaclyn was napping, and then let her finish once she woke up. Grammie baked a ham with Scallopped Potatoes and Green Bean Caserole. David and Donna also had their first taste of Silver Oak that night. Mommy, Uncle Jake, and Cousin David played around on the piano and guitar for a little bit and we ended the night with Grammie's AMAZING cheesecake! This was definitely the BEST CHRISTMAS EVER! Being a Mommy at Christmas is even more fun than being the kid at one!
Once Jaclyn went down for her nap, John, Chris, and Jake opened their stockings from Grammie, which contained remote-control cars. They spent almost half an hour playing with them in our court and even built a ramp before Chris had to go to work. It was so great to see the brothers getting to "play" together! When everyone's so busy, it's times like these that really matter; John and I both really miss getting to hang out together with them like we used to! Grammie also bought her boys tickets to the last RAIDER'S game!
Here's one of my favorite pictures that John took of Jaclyn during her lunch. You can't really tell it's a Christmas picuture, but I think it's probably one of the best!These are pictures of Jaclyn's big gift from Santa. Uncle Jake put it together for her while she was napping. It's a pretty cool toy, even if it does take up a good portion of our family room! Finally, here's Jaclyn before opening her last present. If you can't tell, she REALLY loves being the center of attention. Grammie bought Jaclyn her first "American Girl, Bitty Baby" doll. Jaclyn loves this doll, and the coolest thing for us is we get to see how much she's learned already and how AWARE she is of everything that's said around her. We're pretty sure she tried to say "Baby" when she opened this doll, and since Christmas, we've put it down with all of her other toys and asked her, "Where's your Baby?" Every time, she'll go right to it and pick it up. She's done this correctly over a dozen times, and has encouraged us to test what other vocabulary she understands. So far she for sure knows what her "Baby," "Book," and "Ball" are. We're also pretty sure she understands the word "No," but has also decided that she won't obey it every time. We can't believe how much she understands already. She really is growing up fast!
Here's Jaclyn with Grammie in her Christmas Day outfit. For such an eventful day, you'd never be able to tell by looking at her would you? We hope you enjoyed seeing a "snapshot" of Jaclyn's first Christmas. More importantly, we hope you all had as great a Christmas as we did!
Here's Dillon with Jaclyn.
The small group shot....
...and the large group shot. Jaclyn and Charlee are hard to see with us so small, but they're in there too! (Unfortunately, you can't click on this picture to make it bigger since I stole it off of Luke and Casey's blog; Thanks Luke!)
AND THE BOYS!
