a watson family christmas

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas spent with family and friends! We had a great time and it was nice to be able to spend sometime with everyone!

Every Christmas Eve, we get together with my in.laws for dinner and games. This year we had everyone over to our house and we had a fantastic Mexican dinner! My MIL made yummy enchiladas, my SIL brought the fixings for a taco salad and I provided the refried beans, Mexican rice and yummy peppermint cupcakes!

I follow a fun blog called Glorious Treats and she featured some pretty peppermint cupcakes that she recently made for her hubby's co-workers. After I saw the picture I fell in love and decided to follow her icing recipe and instead of making the chocolate cupcakes from scratch like her post, I just used a cake mix to make things a little easier on myself! I was able to find the peppermint Andes candies that she used but I instead decided to garnish the cupcakes with a whole candy instead of a piece like the post showed. I thought the candy canes on them looked so cute!

The cupcakes before putting the candy on top! 



And after!



After dinner we all gathered in the family room and watched Evan open one gift. He opened his Woody pj's and he looked so cute in them! My SIL pointed out that he looks like he's standing with his thumbs in belt loops or something! So cute!

On Christmas morning Evan opened up all his presents first and it was like there was a Toy Story 3 explosion in our house! haha! He got so many things from Toy Story 3 it was ridiculous...but so fun! Then all three of us opened up our stockings and I've just got to say that my hubby really did it this time! He had tissue paper sticking out the top and as I removed it I could see more stuffing inside. This is what I found:



He used one dollar bills (with a $20 stashed in there too!) as tissue paper and at the bottom was a Starbucks card! Talk about yippee!!! I was so excited that he got all creative like this and it was probably the best surprise of the day!

At around 1:00 we headed over to my parents house where my sister and her family where along with my brother and his new bride! It was so nice to have everyone together in one place! I think that that was the first time for that since they got married in September! It was great!

I was really excited to give my gift to my sister because I had gone and had one of their wedding pictures put on canvas. It came out so beautiful and I just couldn't wait to see the look on her face! Here's how it went down:



I just love the smile she has and I can't wait to see where she puts it in her house!

After our time spent at my parents house, we headed over to Ben's mom's where his sister and hubby where too. We decided to opened gifts first before sitting down for our annual Christmas day breakfast. We usually have it in the morning but since we changed plans this year and went to my parents first we had breakfast for dinner! Yum!

I had gone and done the same thing for my SIL and had one of her wedding pictures put on canvas. I was a little nervous that it wouldn't be delivered in time but it arrived on Christmas Eve and it was wonderful! Here's how that went!



I think it's safe to say they both loved their canvases! I also made a calender for both my parents and MIL with a picture of Evan for each month. I chose pictures of him from each of those months from this past year. I had a fun time putting it together at Tiny Prints. The only thing I wish they let me do was put in birthdays and other special occasions but overall I really liked how they turned out.

Here's my MIL opening hers:



Then after breakfast, we got together in the living room for our annual Christmas picture. But before we did I got a little silly with my new toy. My wonderful hubby bought me a fun new wireless shutter remote for my camera. I was trying it out and showing everyone how it worked and I got these fun pictures!

 

 

And then my BIL decided to jump in!

 

And then a picture with my favorite little man!

And finally the family picture!



So that was our Christmas! I always get a little bummed once everything calms down and I've actually been feeling a little under the weather over the past couple days. I'm looking forward to New Year's Eve and making some yummy treats! I hope I start feeling better by then!

Hoping you all had a fabulous Christmas and that your New Year celebration is full of fun memories!