It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas....

I love Christmas time, but sometimes I really DO NOT find joy in all the stuff that leads up to Christmas. However, since I have started allowing my family to help decorate our home, I've found that I am not quite so stressed out. 

We are easily distracted....but eventually we get back on track!

So we almost had a tragedy. I lent our lights to someone and they were never returned. I can't remember who I lent them to, and they obviously forgot who they borrowed them from. So we almost didn't have lights at our house.

The boys were upset because we all know that Santa can't find your house if it isn't lit up right?

Well, I posted on Facebook trying to jog everyone's memory if they had my lights. No one fessed up. But, a friend of mine that I grew up with told me that she had some extra lights that I could have. We met up and she gave me her lights and Jared and the boys put them right up.

Hooray! Now we were really ready for Christmas!

One of my favorite things is my Willow Tree nativity....

This year instead of an advent calendar, we counted down the days until Christmas with a service jar. Every day we picked out a service that we would do that day. Sometimes it was a small thing, sometimes big, sometimes it was something that the boys didn't think was service at all.

We weren't perfect at it, but we got most of the days done. I really liked doing this and the boys had a great time too. I would really like to make this a tradition in our family.

We had our ward Christmas party. Reagan sang. She did a great job.

Aren't my friends so cute? Especially when they color coordinate their outfits to be super Christmassy. 

Danny was the life of the party.....like always.....

The Willis and Schmerfeld kids re-enacted the Nativity. It was great. Dress rehearsals was a little rough because an angel tumbled down the stairs head first and some of the wise men kept running around the stage. 

But for the final performance - they pulled it off without a hitch!

When Macy caught me taking pictures - she was determined to make sure her smiling face was in it!

So - how did you get ready for the holidays?