As many people know, we have four major celebrations in a ten day period (Wendy's birthday, Christmas, our wedding anniversary, and New Year's). It makes for a bit of a crazy holiday season. We're half-way there as our Christmas celebrations wound down.

We spent Christmas Eve day with Wendy's family. It was the first time since our wedding, three years ago, that the entire clan had gotten together. It was a great day of celebration and, with a house full of kids, it was blessedly noisy and chaotic. The weather cooperated for us to make the trek without too much trouble and Wendy's new GPS system (a birthday present) calculated our arrival time with amazing precision.

Christmas morning was spent opening gifts with Madison. Not that she had any real gifts to open. She's at the "just hand over an envelope of cash" stage (and she had several envelopes from various family members). We all headed to Des Moines late morning to spend much of the rest of the day with my family. My Dad and brother Tim made eierflensjes (a Dutch crepe) which is a long-time family treat and tradition. We then opened gifts and headed home in the late afternoon.

It was strange not having Taylor with us, but she called in the afternoon on Christmas Day. She sounded absolutely wonderful. She said she's been eating a lot and has even been learning to cook as each member of her team are responsible for cooking (that's a huge step for Taylor).

And so, another year of fun, food, family and celebrating our Saviour's arrival has passed. Here are a few photos to enjoy.