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Christmas Eve at the Boling's brought lots of fun, laughter, and a new tradition.

While opening presents Abram kept counting his, then walking over and getting presents from everyone else's pile, taking them back to his pile and recounting. He would get so excited as his pile got bigger!


Present Time --- Eli opening one of his Star Wars Lego sets. (Have you ever seen how many pieces those boxes have ?!?!), Emma getting a look at her new camera, and Abram tearing into his train set.

Fountain of Chocolate ~~~ Charity brought her Chocolate Fountain and you would have thought that it was the best present all evening! Everyone wanted in on the fun. Abram wanted me to snap a pic of his chocolate covered cake, but his face offered a better photo! The fountain was a hit & it is something that we will have each year!

Despite Eli's resistance* to wearing the Santa hat, I was able to get a photo of them!

*for some reason he thinks he is too old now!

Man I so love these wonderful children that God has so lovingly Blessed us with!!

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Our Family Photo at Nana and Papa's - Christmas Eve 2000

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Out of all the photos I have taken of Papa George with Eli & Emma over the years, these from Christmas Eve 1998 and 2000 are my absolute favorite!!!

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The 1st set is Eli & Papa in 1998. Papa is introducing Eli to the Toothpick!
Papa always seemed to have a toothpick in his mouth
and Eli used to be simply fascinated with it.

In this photo, Papa was tickling Emma and each time

I look at it I can still hear her giggle of absolute Joy!

So since I am allergic to the Christmas Trees we normally cut down to decorate, this year we decided to try a different kind which was cut in North Carolina and being sold by the tree farm we have been going to lately. Well everyone was on board with this except for Eli. He was having major issues that we were changing our tradition just because "your arms get a rash when you put the lights on!!" He kept insisting he was not happy with the change but decided that in the end I wasn't going to change my mind.

A few days later Eli comes in the door with a huge branch he had found on the mountain. He took it in his room, propped it up against the wall, added some lights and then some ornaments. He quickly came to figure out that each time he walked by it or really even breathed that the branch fell over and that wasn't going to work at all.

On Saturday afternoon I went outside and saw Eli up on the mountain behind the house. I asked him what he was doing and he said "I am starting my own tradition!!" He was chopping down his own tree and was as happy as can be while doing it!

This time however he got a pot to stand it in before decorating.

All in all I think we were both very pleased with his hard work!

While I was in the midst of some cleaning tonight I came across some old photos of Shalena and I. I looked to see if there any of us and Santa in the box and ding-ding-ding...since Mom was a Full Fledged Paparazzi back then there were!! YAY Mom -- Now I can prove to the 2E's that I got my camera-happy skills naturally!

This 1st two are missing the big man himself but I just love our outfits!!


I loved that ole plastic Santa! I would actually like to have one if anyone comes across one!!




Mom looks like she is enjoying Santa waaaayyy more than Shay & I were!!




Ok -- Now it seems like we got the hang of it!!

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