Christmas at Grandmas

Saturday, December 26th

We took off from Ames for Okoboji Saturday morning. The roads were good, so we made it in good time. We arrived just in time for Grandma's delicious lunch of sloppy joes, cheese soup, and egg salad sandwiches. After lunch my mom and I went shopping at a few of the stores in town while others played Risk (Dad won again!). I love the shops in Okbooji, especially at Christmas time. For dinner Grandma had cheesy potatoes, ham, and green beans. We never go hungry at Grandma's!

Sunday, December 27th
We woke up to rolls and A LOT of coffee. With so many people at Grandma's it is always a trick to get in for a shower. Everyone managed to get a shower before Christmas lunch. This year we celebrated earlier in the day, so had a Christmas lunch. We had Grandma's traditional roast, potatoes, corn, veggies, bona duce cheese, rolls, 7 layer salad, hot tamale salad, herring, olives, and root beer. After lunch we passed the candy tray as always with all of Grandma's yummy treats. Cleanup when fast and we jumped right into the next phase of the day. We cannot start presents until every combination of pictures are taken. We go much faster now that we are older! Wendy read the Bible passage this year and did a great job. The whole group then sang "Hark the Herald"... this rendition will not be on iTunes top 10. ;)  Grandma got me the nativity set and star backdrop for my nativity scene. My mom got me the three wisemen, so it is extra special having the set given to me in different groups from my favorite people. It will be fun to add on to it next year with more of the pieces.

We spent the rest of the day relaxing and playing games. We were going to leave Monday morning, but a big snow storm was moving up from the South so we all left that night. Justus and I left around 8:00 after getting Grandma's iPad setup. We made it back to Norwalk around midnight. When we woke up Monday there was quite a bit of snow and the wind was bad. So, I am happy we did leave early. It was another memorable year with a lot of great memories! I am so blessed to have a great family and rich traditions.

The "kids" table

Grandma's main tree

Tensen selfie

Grandpa Craig & Grandma Sharol

The Bass Family 2015

Grandparents and Grandkids

Grandma's Swedish Tree

My Nativity Scene setup at home- love it is from Grandma and Mom

Christmas Day

I LOVE Christmas mornings at my parents' house. It use to be Wendy woke everyone up early to open presents, but this year I had to wake everyone up! Sam and Wendy have turned into such sleepyheads in college. I love coming upstairs and seeing how my mom...I mean Santa... left the fireplace setup. 

Santa came...love this scene. 

Opening our stockings. Best part was when Wendy found a bracelet that was not from this year. Not sure how many Christmas ago she was suppose to get that! haha

Dad forgot to wrap our presents, so waited behind the wall to bring them out. Silly Dad! 

Justus looking handsome in his new coat. 

Dad got a map to mark all the National Parks he has been to.

Pretty Christmas Day, so had to take a selfie. 

After our morning of fun, we headed to Joan's for lunch and her annual gift game. The lunch was delicious and fun seeing everyone. It was nice to spend so much time with Grandpa Jack, he is as feisty as ever. I love Joan's gift game. She wraps a gift many times and it gets passed around the room. Each person can only unwrap one layer at a time then it is passed on. If you take off the final layer it is yours! I scored the Peppermint Bark this year, which Justus was pretty pumped about.

Peppermint bark for the win! 

Grandpa Jack, Grandkids, and Gunner

Cousins + Mike cerca HS graduation

Grandpa Jack :)

After a great day with my side of the family, we headed to Kim's for dinner. We had a delicious Mexican casserole and my favorite- mulled wine. The theme of gifts this year were socks- everyone got socks! We stayed at Kim's so we could take off for Okoboji the next morning. I was able to squeeze in a Yoga session before our Starbucks stop and 3+hour car ride.

Starbucks struggling with the spelling of our names. At least they tasted yummy.