Christmas time is Here...Our favorite time of the Year!

I cannot tell you how happy I was that Thanksgiving was here and I could begin my Christmas music and movie extravaganzas! :)  Bryan always gives me a hard time about watching the Lifetime, Hallmark or ABC Family Christmas movies...and this year there are sooo many new ones I can't wait to watch them all (or at least what I can).


We love this time of year because of all of the family we get to see, celebrating the birth of our Saviour and giving of gifts.  It brings such great joy to our hearts to see people excited.


To begin the holiday season festivities our friends, the Millers, invited a small group of us over for a tacky Christmas party. :)

Bryan wore red with a reindeer tie his sister Chantel gave him last Christmas along with the Iowa State Santa hat.  I went as a present wrapped in ribbon, topped off with a bow.

 Tonks, the Millers' dog, was even dressed up with a jingle bell collar and Santa hat!

Megan and Chris Coffey and their adorable sweaters.

 Eric, Lindsey and Tonks Miller with their cute outfits!

Santa and his elf (aka. Matthew and Kandace)...awesome outfits they found at K-Mart. 

We did a white elephant gift exchange.  Kandace selected mine - a Scripture art canvas decoration and the book "Heaven is for Real".  I had two of the books! 

Lindsey took the time to create a Christmas game for all of us to play which was a combination of HumDingers, Sherades, Pictionary, Guess who the Person Is, and Christmas trivia.  It was so much fun. 

They guys trying hard at the scavenger hunt that completed the game...needless to say, the ladies won! :)

Jimmy and Kaitlyn Balough, the new couple in our small group, joined us later that evening for more games and spoons.  FYI - if you ever play Spoons with Bryan, be careful...he's viscous! 

The next day Bryan's mom, dad, sister, Grammie Mikels and Aunt Danette came down to visit.  Grammie and Danette had never to been to our house.  We met them at our church as we were taking them to our church's Christmas program called Christmas at Resurrection.  It was a wonderful program filled with a great story, songs, talent and the Christmas story.

That evening Bryan and I had the annual Turner Holiday Party at the LIVESTRONG Sporting Park.  We took our first family Christmas photo.

What a wonderful weekend and start to the Christmas festivities!  We had such a great time with Bryan's family in town, even though it was short.