Because my parents were out of town for part of our time in Calgary, it nicely and easily divided our time between the two families. I loved spending time at my parents house playing cribbage, sushi go and going for walks with my Mom. I think my niece Theia was the most excited to have us around! She was Greta's little shadow - it was adorable! It really was so good to sneak up to Calgary for a quick trip and spend time with our family. 

While we were in Calgary, we went tobogganing with the Larsen family. We love our cousins! It was so fun to be outside in the sunshine. I love the big Alberta sky and sunshine. I was laughing to myself at the people wearing only sweaters, no coats. Feeling really grateful for this time that we got to spend out of doors with some of our favorite people!

And a couple more photos of our time hanging out the the Larsens. We loved playing games (Splendor anyone?!) and Maeve was adored by all. It was all so good.

Christmas was so good this year. We've really found our stride for what feels right for our family. It was such a leisurely and relaxing day. Holly and Greta were both so excited and grateful for everything - Santa brought them gum and that made all their wishes come true! They are really easy to please children and an overall joy. This Christmas, I feel like we had a good number of gifts. Not too many, except for Maeve. We gave Holly and Greta slippers on Christmas Eve and a game on Christmas Day. Not much, but honestly, just right. My favorite gifts given and received were the gifts that Holly and Greta gave to each other. They were so excited to shop for one another and then SO excited to watch their sister open their gift. That was one of the very best parts of Christmas!

My second favorite gift was Maeve sleeping through the night on Christmas Eve! Woo hoo! While it hasn't lasted she did give us a few nights of uninterrupted sleep and they were wonderful! 

Holly unfortunately got a tummy bug on Christmas Day in the afternoon, which affected our Christmas dinner plans. While that was disappointing, it seemed that nothing could take away the magic of the day. It was so peaceful and relaxing and lovely. Truly, it was what we needed.

I really, really enjoyed our Sunday service on Christmas Eve - it was so beautiful. It made me wish that our church always did a worship service on Christmas Eve regardless of what day it lands on. I appreciated the reminder of what the central focus of this holiday is for. I'm grateful for Jesus! I've learned a lot about the atonement this year. I read the book, The Peacegiver, this fall and it shared the atonement and Jesus in a really approachable and relatable way. 

Here's some snapshots of my beautiful family! Holly is getting so tall and grown up looking!

Pretty often, I feel a flood of gratitude that Maeve is in our family. She really is something special and we all adore her. Before Christmas, the girls were playing with friends and it was just Maeve and me doing chores around the house. I'm so glad this baby was born!

She's begun to move around enough to follow me around the house. One thing she loves to do is sit on my feet until I pick her up. All the love for this gal!