This year we spent Christmas with my family at a rental house in Moss Beach. The morning before we left we opened presents with our own little family. The big thing on the side was one of Lucas's and Paige's presents. It was too big to wrap so we just threw a blanket over it.
Opening presents...
Opening the big present from grandma and grandpa George.
And you always have to take a pj's picture in front of the tree.
The first day we spent with my family we actually went to Alcatraz. I'll post those pictures later. We had a big group and it was a lot of fun. About half of the time we spent at the rental house it was pouring rain. The other half of the time when it was sunny, everyone threw on their shoes and jackets and spent as much time at the beach as possible before it started raining again. This day we were there during low tide and the tide pools were really cool.
Lucas found a fun rock to climb on.
Checking out a starfish in one of the tide pools.
Lucas wanted to touch everything, but when he touched this sea anemone, it started to close around his finger.
It scared the crap out of him. You can't really tell in this picture but he had just pulled his hand back really quick and had a freaked out look on his face.
The beach was really pretty considering how chilly it was outside.
The sea lions came to bask in the sun. Ryan walked out pretty far in the tide pools to get pictures of the sea lions and while he was out there, a big wave came from behind and soaked him. It was pretty hilarious. He held the camera up so it wouldn't get wet, but everything else got drenched.
When the weather was rainy, we had fun staying inside eating yummy food, decorating cookies...
....reading Christmas stories....
... cuddling with babies...
...and attacking Uncle Mark with light sabers...
Then Christmas morning came.
We all took turns handing out presents to the siblings and families we had.
And then we had presents and stockings from my parents too.
It took a while to open presents for 30 people. We had to take a break halfway through for breakfast. Nate made Kneaders french toast and it was AMAZING! Then we had one last day for the kids to play together and pack up before we had to go. We had a great Christmas spending time with family!
Thanks Mom and Dad for renting the house for all of us to stay in, and for cleaning it all up afterwards.
4 comments:
I love the picture of Lucas sitting legs crossed on the rock by the beach. It is so cute!! You should blow it up huge (like 30 inches) and frame it in your house. :)
Glad you guys had a fun Christmas! the tide pools looked really cool.
Thanks for helping to make our Christmas so wonderful. I'll have happy memories for years to come. It was a challenge to get a picture of the whole group, but it means a lot to me that we managed to do it.
That's a good idea to rent a house so you can all stay in one place! Seeing all your pictures of the beach makes me want to move to California--but don't get your hopes up. ;) We both know Matt would never let that happen. :P
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