Celebrating Christmas With Grandparents

Our kids are so lucky to have two incredible sets of grandparents who put so much effort into having great experiences together.  For the last several years my parents, Grandpa and Grandma Broadbent, have had a grandkids Christmas party.  They have done various activities each year but the adventure always includes visit to Santa.  This is the first year that Ruby and Juniper were old enough to be invited to the party so the grandparents were definitely outnumbered with 7 kids.  I worried that it might get a little too wild for them, but they assured me they were up for the challenge.  We dropped the kids off at Build a Bear and they spent quite awhile choosing their bears and  personalizing each with details like sounds, clothes and names.  My kids loved putting the hearts into their new bears and knowing they were made with love. 

After finishing at Build a Bear they visited Santa, had dinner, and finished at the indoor playground where the kids and the bears all had a great time running wild.  There was one small incident when Ruby got lost at the food court for a few minutes.  Apparently she wandered off then started to cry attracting a woman's attention who then found a security guard.  By then my parents were searching and everyone was quickly reunited.  I didn't know about it until later so I only got concerned after the fact.  Ruby hasn't seemed to be too affected by it but hopefully learned to stick close by when we are out and about.  Overall the kids thought the party was fantastic and are already looking forward to next year's party. 

The new bear seem to be happy with their new home

And Ruby and Luke have definitely loved their new friends

The Whitesides family Christmas party has not ever had a firm date and this year it worked best to have it early in the month.  Kind of a fun way to get the month going.  Grandpa and Grandma Whitesides always work so hard to make sure the grandkids all have a great time.  Gayle is fantastic at getting everyone to participate in Christmas song sing-a-longs and the traditional nativity.  We loved having the big kids, the little kids, and all of the rest of the family together and are thankful for grandparents that that made it all possible.