And now for JORDAN'S Family Christmas

Ok, I promise, this is the last installment of Christmas. I have New Years' to blog about already!!

First things first: The most beautiful girl in the world, on her way to Grandma and Grandpa Taylor's house for Christmas Eve. She is in her (gifted by Grandma) "My First Christmas" outfit :)

And here's Grandma. She spoiled Claire ROTTEN!! :) Here she is with a HUGE handfull of Skittles in her little hand. She ate them ALL. It was a great night!

And here she is with the Skittles again. We are awesome parents.

And here's our little cutie, Sam, Jenn's little boy! So adorable! And HUGE--like, he's REALLY tall. He's a few months behind Claire and way bigger! (not that that's hard, I guess, this IS Claire we're talking about!)

And my three beautiful sisters-in-law, from left to right: Jessica, Katie, and Camille!

And here's Camille with Jenn's little girl, Ava. She's getting so big!!

Ummm...we all got these socks for Christmas. They're pretty suhweeeeet!

And speaking of sweet, here is my SWEET husband. (I know what you're thinking..."gag me")

He is doing what he does best: Hanging out on the computer. Fixing stuff and whatever else he does. That's his idea of FUN!

And here's me with Jenn's other little girl, Lexi. Well, she's not that little anymore... She got a "money tree" for Christmas...cute idea!! (that's where the skittles came from--they were in the money tree pot, you know, like in lieu of "dirt")

Family picture time! This is the best we could get :)

center;">And I tried for a LONG time. I wanted to get a CUTE picture like this one of my friend, Megan's boy, Porter But alas, she would NOT cooperate!!

And now here is a taste of what Claire thought about her new little puppy toy :) Right now, whenever you ask her "what does the doggie say?" She like hyperventilates. You will see it here. It's so funny!

And here's Jenn and little Sam!

And Jessica and me. Being our usual dorky selves!

The Three Amigas! Jessica, me, and Camille

Claire just being cute. As usual.

She (and I) was very excited about the set of Baby Einstein books Camille got her!

And Claire got this super-cute hat that has a matching sweater. So fun!

And finally, Ava got one of those sit and spin toys that we all know and love from our childhood, right? This one is more hi-tec, of course, and plays music :) Claire loved it too. It's hilarious how Jessica is saying "weeee!" as she goes around and Claire is imitating her. So fun.

Such a great time!!! Thank you, Dan and Lenore, for the Best Christmas Ever! (well, until the next one, because they are ALL the best :)

'Twas the night before the night before Christmas...

(the 23rd...)

And all through the house

Not a baby was stirring (which is good because it was like 1am!)

Not even a mouse (because we don't have any here, thank you very much!)

The stockings were hung

On the piano with care (because of Claire's ability to pull on them and seriously injure herself with the stocking holders)

In hopes that we'd actually fill them with goodies this year.

(many times we really don't fill them, it's pathetic)

Janessa & Jordan were NOT nestled all snug in their beds

With visions of (NOT sugar plums..what are those anyway??) frosted sugar cookies dancing in their heads

Janessa in her favorite men's Hollister sweatshirt courtesy of her husband, and Jordan in his...beanie

Had just settled in the living room for a nice peek at the "stash"

So, we weren't supposed to GET anything for each other this year. BUT, Jordan, like the good husband he is, knows that Janessa loves it when he breaks that rule :) And he got her some stuff ANYWAY. NOW, he will forever say that I COULDN'T WAIT to open my gifts, but HEY. HE asked ME if I wanted to open them, and what was I supposed to say?? NO?

So here goes :)

*WARNING* Scary images of a makeup-free Janessa coming up... you may want to shield your eyes...

***But first: Is this not SUCH PRETTY wrapping paper? :)

The easy-find lid tupperware! YAY!

And I was very excited about this one: (Jordan knows I LOVE purple!)

Some of the boxes were really hard to open: (or maybe I'm just a dork and didn't get a knife or something...trying to rip packing tape with your bare hands might not be that easy...)

Jordan also got me a sweater from Macy's and two sweaters from his favorite store: Savers. Yep! They are cute too!

Now, since I was actually sticking to our "no presents" plan (since I already got this beauty and Jordan got a blu-ray player for himself for the same price as I got the camera...crazy!) I had gotten him NOTHING. NADA. ZILCH. BUT, he masqueraded the presents he got ME that morning, so I HAD to get him something! (even when he told me not to!)

So I headed to Walmart the night of the 23rd with my friends, Rachel & Jonathan, and Megan. Jonathan was awesome bc I needed to get a "good quality crescent wrench" and I had NO idea what that was or what "good quality" was) and so he helped me get it. And then I got him candy.

My manly man with the crescent wrenches :)

Um...I even wrapped the gum (Jordan LOVES pina colada anything!) so he'd have more than one present to unwrap haha ;)

And wrapped the Reeses...

And some candy Jordan likes but I DON'T, so it was awesome!!

Christmas with MY Family.

Ok, we're doing a post for each of the families. Don't be alarmed when you see like NO pictures at my parents house...sorry guys, I kinda forgot about taking pictures after getting there and eating all that delicious food...

But FIRST: Check out the awesome apron my Mom made me!! Fof, I LOVE it, and have used it a LOT this year... and yes, Heather, I know it's "frufru" and that I am to blame (I helped my Mom pick out the fabric, pattern, etc. and according to her, I "made" her make one for all of the girls in the family...whatever, there was NO forcing here...).

So here we are at my parents' house. Yes, such a great picture. But when you don't have that many... My mom, Claire, me, and Laurencita.

And here is a great one of Lauren and Claire...what is Lauren so afraid of? :) Getting her picture taken, I'm sure...and she not even a teenager with braces yet!

And finally, here's Claire opening her very first Christmas present!

That Hawaiian counting book...she LOVES it. She loves to pull every single little loose piece out of it and get them lost! Don't worry, Mommy has found them all.

Jordan and me with Grandma Fern...yeah, this is the best picture we had :)

And cousin, Kiera, is taking Claire somewhere here...hmm...

And here's my honey (pictured with Jay and Claire) in a nice little Santa hat! Great look for you, babe!

And here's what we got my parents for Christmas. As you can see, there are MANY picture frames that still need to be filled!

Thanks Mom and Dad for a great Christmas!!

O Christmas Tree, O Christmas Tree!

Seriously. Where does the time go? It's Christmas time again, and it feels like I was JUST pregnant.

The excitement and simultaneous dread of putting up the Christmas decorations came to the Taylor house this past week... Claire did NOT experience dread, and was very interested in the tree!

This year I got a couple of new ornaments :) Tai Pan, day after Christmas sale, of course! And no, I'm not usually an after-Thanksgiving day shopper, but Claire was already up at the CRACK of dawn and I had nothing better to do. Plus Tai Pan always gives a free item if you get there before 8am, and this year they were red and green peppermint votives, instead of a cheesy snowman candy jar like last year. (I apologize to those who like snowman candy jars...)

AND, I was triumphant in using...wait for it...wait for it.... the POWER DRILL!!! Yes. I used the drill. I used to call it a screw driver, but my husband informed me that the "power tool" kind is called a "power drill." (Yes, now you know where I'm coming from in the tool expertise spectrum.)

Well, I, ALL BY MYSELF put up this little beauty:

I drilled holes in the doorway corners, then screwed in the drywall screws, and zip-tied the garland to the screws. Let's be honest, Jordan told me this is how I should put it up, but when he was telling me this, we had planned for HIM to do it. But, he went to work, and I decided I need to be more self-sufficient! And there I was, drill in hand!!

*some people have marathons under their belts...I have a garland hanging*