Christmas + The Best of 2010

I meant to write this before Jan. 1st 2011, but that didn't happen. With one thing and another, our family sadly caught a stomach bug/flu/cold sickness the last week on Dec. It seemed to affect everybody a little differently. Anyway I had written this:

Merry Christmas everyone! We had a fabulous Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Our family doesn't decorate anything in our house until Christmas Eve which makes Christmas Eve such a fun day. Also the littlest member of our family (Joey) has a big announcement. *Drum roll please!* Joey started walking! Not just a little-teetering-steps-here-and-there walking, but walking-across-the-room-all-the-time walking. He started on Christmas Eve and is sooo cute!!!

And that's as much as I had gotten too. I've come to realize that I make this blog way more complicated than it could be. I try to fit in as many pictures as I can and usually since I'm way behind, I have to sift through hundreds of pictures and find the best ones and then figure out what to write, ect.

So I have a blog related New Years Resolution: To post more often and more simply. I got a bad start since it's already the middle of January, however that's okay. :) But it's been a month since my last post, plus we finished 2010, and had Christmas, so this will be one more lengthy catch-up post. (I will try to go easy on the pictures!)

First off, Christmas. And here they are:

Our living room tree {fake} and mantle:
Our family room mantle and windowsill:
Our family room tree {real }:
All the kids minus Joey + Grandad right before Christmas Eve Mass:
The tree Christmas morning - that's a lot of gifts:
I like to get a picture of all my siblings holding their first gift before we open anything, so here is Benny:

And John Paul:

Cecilia:

Rose:
And Max:
Me and Benny:

Joey got a lot of toys which he enjoyed playing with:

My mom turned John Paul into an avid reader with the Percy Jackson series. Here you see Dad in the left reading a new book (Cake Wrecks by Jen Yates), and John Paul reading the 4th book of the Percy Jackson series (by Rick Riordan) which he had just received:

Cecilia and I did a watercolor class in school and Cecilia gave this painting to Grandad:
(Max, Grandad and Cecilia)
The biggest surprise for all of us kids including me (and I usually know most of the gifts except for mine) was a Wii! This is John Paul and Max after my dad opened the Wii and they opened a Wii Starwars game and a Wii Indiana Jones game:
Our Christmas morning brunch is always scrumptious Eggs Benedict:
We sang Christmas carols before eating:
Later in the day the rest of the Anthony clan joined us. Lil' David is so cute:
Grandma and Grandpa Anthony gave us one big family gift this year, which we had to figure out what it was by putting together a puzzle which my Grandmother made:
The finished result (It reads: One year family membership to the wet and wonderful world of the National Aquarium) :

Our whole family + Beth, David, Grandma and Papa Anthony, Grammy and Grandad, gathered around for Christmas dinner:

Well I guess that wasn't exactly going easy on the pictures! Oh well, a picture can say a thousand words, so...

I had originally planned on putting up some pictures of the highlights of 2010, but there are simply too many from Dec. alone! So just a quick recap of December:

In my last post I mentioned in one of the facts that Chris and Ania were coming over for dinner the next night. Well they came and we had a fabulous time. Christ brought his camera which he uses to film weddings and he let me use it! Here are some pictures that I got with his camera and lens:









Next a few other highlights from December:

Las Posadas: (A Mexican feast day - look it up!)

(Going to door to door:)

I had to include this picture of Rose, I had zoomed in on her and she didn't know I was taking the picture so this a genuine natural smile!

The week before Christmas we went to Portrait Inovations and got our pictures taken. My mom ordered the package which came with the CD (that's how I have the pictures). The new photo at the top of this blog (the header) was our family photo.

The girls, Cecilia, Rose and I:
The boys, John Paul, Ben, Max and Joey:
For our family shot the boys wore green plaid and the girls were in brown. However for the individual pictures we all changed. My mom let us all pick what we wanted to wear.

Joey:
Benny:
Rosie:
Max:
John Paul:
Cecilia:

And me:
The photographer then wanted a shot of all us kids in our different outfits:



Phew! I told you I don't make this easy. :D I still would like to post the highlights of 2010 at some point, but who knows if that will ever happen! For now, this will do!

And seeing as it is 1:17AM and I really should be in bed and asleep, goodnight!

Love,