It’s been a week since we came home from Florida, and more than two weeks since we celebrated Christmas there, but I’m just now getting my act together to post some pictures. I had quite a bit of work to catch up on when we got back, and then Jared’s uncle and aunt stayed here for a couple of days while they got their daughters adjusted at school. But without further ado, I now present our official Christmas 2009 recap.
After a Christmas Eve service at my dad’s church in Jacksonville, we all drove the hour or so to the Palm Coast, where Carol had rented two condos for the 17 of us. Opening gifts was chaos, given the fact that there were eight children involved (six of them age four and under), and they all seemed to want to steal play with each other’s gifts. Below is Judah in his new dragon suit from Dad and Carol. He wasn’t all that thrilled about it, but the new (noisy) fire truck did make it all better.
The portion of the week that was not devoted to babies (such cute babies!) we spent playing games, particularly a Scrabble-type game called Take Two that we picked up from Jared’s family. Trey and my dad spent one afternoon using all the tiles to make a gigantic puzzle. We also spent some time in the heated pool, though it wasn’t quite heated enough, and most of us (two-year-olds included) ended up in the scalding hot tub.
One afternoon we visited a nearby marine park, where we got to see some dolphins swimming and doing their acrobatics. The kids were pretty excited about it. But for my money, it doesn’t get much cuter than seeing Judah and Lauren holding hands while strolling along. Below is a picture of my dad and Carol with six of their eight grandkids (the two babies were elsewhere).
The weather was pretty chilly while we were there—nothing compared to Chicago’s current temperature of nine degrees, mind you—but our high never topped 60. Still, we enjoyed some great walks on the beach. The below picture (top middle) shows our condos overlooking the ocean. You can’t really tell, but Judah is attempting to throw a starfish back into the water. And Bricer is giving us his best cheese face, which is his typical smile.
Years ago, when Jared and I were first married, my family made a trip down to Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. I have this memory of a breezy afternoon we spent on the beach, flying a kite. The only kids around back then were Skye and Trey, and they were just toddlers. The memory of that lovely afternoon has stuck with me, so it was fun to spend our last day in Palm Coast doing the same thing—flying a kite on the beach. It was a bit chillier this time, and there were more kids, but it was a precious afternoon nonetheless.
We returned the next day to Jacksonville, where we spent three more nights at Dad and Carol’s house and rang in the new year with everyone but Rich and Andrea (who had already returned home). But more on that later.
Even though it wasn’t a white Christmas, and it might have been the loudest, craziest one yet, I though it was perfect.
Posted by mimsies 
