this is the dress my sister wore for Christmas 25 years ago
Our first family Christmas wasn’t actually as fantastic as what I was hoping for — mainly because Nora had a bad case of diaper rash and was really fussy because we had to wake her up in order to get it to church on time…
But she was just so darn cute in her little Christmas dress that it was all worth it! And you better believe my mom was thrilled that Nora could wear the same dress my sister wore for her first Christmas 25 years ago.
Since Nora was the youngest member of our church, our family got to light the Christ candle at church on Christmas morning. Nora did great and didn’t cry at all, however, she started crying right after we sat down so I had to take her out for the rest of the service.
For the rest of the day, she was pretty fussy thanks to the diaper rash and the lack of a morning nap 🙁
The only way I could calm her down and get her to sleep was to lay on the couch with her on top of me… so I got a Christmas afternoon nap too!
For the FIRST TIME EVER, Dave and I spent a very low-key Christmas afternoon at our house, with just our family. I did make ham — which is kind of a tradition, but we kept the side dishes simple and had ice-cream for dessert.
It was so nice to be able to sit around in our sweatpants with all the Christmas lights and just lounge around watching movies {and trying to calm our crying baby!}
My immediate family came over at night for a light dinner and to open presents. They totally spoiled Nora!
Nora and I got matching ear warmers from my sister Ashley for Christmas… so now we all match.
me, Nora, and my sisters with our matching ear warmers {my sister on the left made them all}
After food, gifts, and a few games, we were back to being “home alone” and in our sweatpants — glorious!
Dave was home the entire week between Christmas and New Years so we had lots of family time and I had a built-in babysitter, which allowed me to be semi-productive!
We celebrated Christmas with Dave’s family on New Year’s Day and Nora was much more cooperative for that party! She also got to hang out with her only cousin… it was cute to see them together.
She got to wear her “Baby’s First Christmas” shirt twice — I had a cute hat too, but it kept falling off.
Despite the challenges of a fussy baby, a little bit of bad weather, and an over-all lack of sleep, we had a great Christmas break and made many wonderful memories during our first Christmas as a family — I’m not sure Dave was quite ready to go back to school today!
Cheryl says
Just an extra tip for diaper rash – the lansinoh they give you for nursing is the best product by far that I have ever used for diaper rash. It is also great to heal cuts, burns and extremely chapped skin. My two girls are in their teens and we still keep a tube in the house for all sorts of first aid. Completely natural and hypoallergenic. If the hospital didn’t give you any (it was the only thing that helped me with soreness in the early days of nursing) it is in the nursing aisle in most major stores.
She is beyond adorable!! =)
Julie says
sounds like my kind of holiday!! i love your headbands. any chance your sister would share the pattern? 🙂
Rebekah says
Beautiful post! I loved looking through all of your festive pics – our Christmas was low key with all the family over our house after the Sunday morning service – presents, food, and, yes SWEATPANTS!
Andrea says
aren’t sweatpants great! I’ve purchased a few new pairs just because I seem to be wearing them all the time lately!!
Glad you had a wonderful low-key Christmas too!
Rebecca says
I thought Christmas Day was going to be awful. My brother was having his in-laws over and our family over. I thought the chaos would get to me. But it didn’t. Maybe it was me. Maybe it was just that I was trying to enjoy the day with my husband and my kids, but we all had a good time.