Christmas Eve 2023

Today is Sunday, and given that it is Christmas Eve, we had KidPak this morning too!  Camille was back from maternity leave, all smiles here as she hosts a game.  The main sanctuary had their yearly Christmas Eve Candlelight Service, but we had some battery-powered candles for downstairs too.  We even had all kinds of fun Christmas games!  Maddie took a lot of really good pictures as our photographer this morning during services.  Pastor Lance read the Christmas story in first service, and Bailee covered the next service.  We had games, fun videos, and a candlelight service with songs and just a great morning together.

Before heading home, we stopped to get Chinese food, our now yearly tradition.  We got it as take-out, and enjoyed our Christmas Eve feast at home together, which was very nice.  The afternoon was busy after that, with us still doing the wrapping for the family Christmas tomorrow.  Getting things set up while watching Christmas specials and movies together.  Some of those included Shirley Temple's "Babes in Toyland" with Jonathan Winters - a real treat, by the way.  We also needed to watch "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" too, and it all led up to our first-time viewing of "Journey to Bethlehem," a new musical rendition of the classic Nativity story.  

It was a fun movie with some great song-and-dance numbers to it.  It also had some pretty glaring moments that in fact did not happen in the Bible.  But overall it wasn't too bad.  It was also a nice way to end our Christmas Eve. 

At bedtime, we read from "The Polar Express" this time, plus "I Shall Wear Midnight."  We said our prayers, and somewhere past midnight, wished each other a "Merry Christmas," and fell fast asleep.