A Talicska Christmas.

We spent Christmas 2011 at my Mom and Dad's house. Kelli, David and Samuel were in town, so it was a very special Christmas with the whole family together. As a family, we had much to celebrate and be thankful for in 2011...and it was so special to have a few days to just all be together and eat and drink until my pants literally exploded off my body. This is a true story.

Pictured below is photographic evidence of what a Christmas tree looks like when 2 very spoiled loved grandchildren are involved (not that we didn't get spoiled, too...but Alex and Samuel took home the loot!)

And these were my two favorite faces all week:

 He kind of looks like a Gremlin in this picture,

but it was his "vroom!" face when he sat in his new
Lightning McQueen chair from Grammi and Poppi.

And here are the snuggle bugs playing with the HIT present of Christmas 2011 - Alex's new tool bench that Uncle Kyle MADE for him! You can even see how he burned "VW" into the corner of the top. It's seriously so cool. And who knew my brother was a woodsmith? Is woodsmith a word? Whatever.

This was one of my all-time favorite moments (please excuse my hot mess of a Christmas morning self):

And, of course, Grammi got in her fair share of snuggles and story time, too:

Pictured here is four generations from my mom's side of the family from when we visited my Great Aunt Theresa (my Grandmother's sister). She met Samuel for the first time!

Tomorrow's post will probably include a list of lies resolutions I'll be totally committed to for at least the next 3 weeks and then will likely abandon. However, I did say that the ONLY thing I wanted to do over break was organize my baking/catchall cupboard in the kitchen and I managed to haul through that at 9:00 last night. So, maybe there's something there, after all...

Until then, I'll leave you with another picture of the two sweetest cousins in existence. They're holding my Mom's ceramic baby Jesus.

"Happy birthday, baby Jesus!"