Traditions

One of my favorite things about the holidays has always been traditions. I always enjoyed them growing up and now I'm enjoying having our own traditions with our little family. Here is a little list of some of our Graham family traditions:
1) Making a gingerbread house...this was our second year doing this and little man absolutely loves it! We have a blast decorating and making a mess with all the icing! I can't wait for Anna to join in on this!2) Decorating the house together as a family
3) Picking out a live tree together (I need to start taking an annual pic of this)
4) Advent calendar-this was a new thing this year. I found felt Christmas tree shaped advent calendar and put little small "activities" in each pocket for each day. They weren't always elaborate-even things as simple as "Read Polar Express tonight" but we really had fun with it.
5) Elf on the Shelf-This was Alfie's (our elf) second year here. He flew many interesting places and Dalton had a great time searching for him each morning!
6) Opening Christmas PJ's on Christmas eve-first year for this but we will definitely continue this fun tradition. A great way to "kick start" the presents and just a fun tradition in general.
7) Reading 'Twas the Night before Christmas and the story of Jesus' birth from the book of Luke on Christmas eve. Important to remember the real reason for the season!
8) Annual best friend Christmas dinner/gift exchange-getting together with the Smathers and the Thaxtons is always a blast. This year everyone came to our house and Zack grilled some yummy steaks and we all exchanged gifts. It was so much fun as it always is. We weren't able to do professional pics this year but here is a pretty good one-it is quite the feat trying to get 5 kids to look at the camera and smile! Also-Dalton, Sadie, and Reese played together so well this year. It's truly like they're all family--they are very sweet to each other and do a very good job with sharing. Here's a little pic of Sadie and Dalton playing on the swing set.