Christmas Eve traditions....

Christmas Eve always begins with our Bethlehem dinner. This year Grandpa Stumm grilled the fish with the help of grandkids. Connor in particular, enjoyed learning how to grill salmon...yes, we know that those who lived at the time of Jesus didn't eat salmon, but, it's such a yummy fish to eat!

The rest of the meal was potato latekas, cheese, olives, dates, bread, and grape juice. It's always fun to eat by candle light and feel the peace that candle light meals bring.

After the meal the kids look forward to acting out the Nativity story. Cailin was Mary this year....and acted the very pregnant part well. (Ahhh, I'm glad my pregnant part is over.)

Delaney plays the angel, Liam and Ryan are shepards and Connor was a wise man.

Connor wanted to include the prophecy's of Samuel the Lamanite in the theatrical prodution this year.

The full cast!

After the play and reading of the story we enjoy opening our family secret santa gifts. We try to keep these a secret and have fun guessing who had our name but often the secret is figured out before the gift exchange.