The Schuchards: Christmas Eve and Christmas Day 2010

On Christmas Eve, we went to the 4:30 p.m. service at church. It was very hectic getting everyone in their Christmas outfits and into the car. It was even harder to get everyone into church, especially since it was snowing!

This photo was the best one of all three of us.....in the other photos, Lila was cross-eyed and/or John was doing his fake smile (the one where he closes his eyes), haha.

After church, we went to the home of our friends, the Jakubiaks, for a lasagna dinner. John was thrilled to have access to a huge bucket of toys belonging to the Jakubiaks' grandchildren. He also played with Ms. Dorothy, Wrenne's sister who was visiting from Tennessee.

We enjoyed a very leisurely Christmas morning. We were so, so happy to be able to talk to Daddy on the webcam for a little while. He even got to see John open one of his presents! Lila slept the whole time.

Obviously, John was much better at opening presents this year, at 23 months, than he was last year, at 11 months. He was able to tear off the wrapping paper pretty well, and he was certainly aware that there would be toys inside the boxes! Still, after opening each present, he wanted to play with the item right away rather than open the next present. For that reason, he barely got through half of his presents by the time we had to start getting ready for Christmas dinner at Steve and Ruthanne's house.

John opened his front-end loader toy while we were webcamming with Grandma Bonnie and Papa Jeff. Here he is with it.....

Here's a video of John playing with his guitar (from Aunt Katharine and Uncle Jarey) and dump truck.....

Guitar and dump truck from Sarah Schuchard on Vimeo.

Here I am opening my present from Ross.....a super fashionable apron from Sur La Table! I've never had a "real" apron before (I don't count the two Starbucks aprons I have from when I worked there).....

One of John's presents from Grandma Kay was a big two-sided easel. There's a chalkboard on one side, and a dry-erase board on the other. My mom bought him chalk, dry-erase markers, and a couple rolls of white paper, which can be hung on either side. Here's John with his new easel.....

Easel from Sarah Schuchard on Vimeo.

Mommy and John opening their stockings.....

Opening stockings from Sarah Schuchard on Vimeo.

John playing with the snowman gel clings that were in his stocking (this entertained him for at least half an hour).....

Lila with her new shirt from Uncle Jesse and Aunt Sarah.....yes, she is a Run DMC fan!

Opening more presents.....

Before we left the house, I took a whole bunch of photos of Lila in her adorable Christmas dress (this time without her sweater). I think they turned out pretty cute!!!! I love her little arms.

At Steve and Ruthanne's house, John showed off a few of his new toys that we had brought with us, including the very noisy guitar and the airplane that Wrenne and Ray had given him. He also got to watch The Little Drummer Boy.

Dinner was fabulous, as always -- beef tenderloin with a mushroom wine sauce, twice-baked potatoes, celery almondine and salad. Dessert was wonderful too -- creme brulee and an assortment of homemade cookies! John was excited to be able to eat his ice cream out of a snowman bowl. He had a chocolate-chip cookie with his ice cream.

After spilling a whole bunch of milk out of his snowman straw cup, John had to be shirtless for the rest of the evening. He didn't seem to mind! Ruthanne put an elf hat on him, and he ran around the house for a good long time.