A Brown Family Christmas Eve

On Christmas Eve Paul and I joined Paul's Parents, Pat and Marv, along with his Brother Karl's family for Christmas Eve dinner, church at his parents church in Fridley, MN, and of course, gift opening! For the past couple of years the adults have forgone gifts and have given donations to Heifer International in honor of one another. Paul's parents identified this worthwhile cause which is a non-profit organization whose goal is to help end world hunger and poverty through self-reliance & sustainability. Paul and I were particularly excited to again give to this cause as a good portion of its support goes to help poverty stricken areas of Peru!! www.heifer.org

Watching Spenser and Abbie's excitement mount as they patiently waited to open gifts until after churchwas definitely the highlight of the night!! Spenser was thrilled with his gifts from Uncle Paul and Aunt Becky, especially the signed photo and football from his current favorite NFL player, Devin Hester of the Chicago Bears (Aunt Becky admits she didn't even know who this is...at age 8 1/2 Spenser's sports knowledge has clearly surpassed that of his Aunt, unless maybe the topic is the Mizzou Tigers and even that would be debatable!!) Abbie was also very excited to open all of her gifts, especially the American Girl doll from Grandma Pat and Grandpa Marv and the Hello Kitty water dispenser from Uncle Paul and Aunt Becky. At one point she even exclaimed, "I can't believe I have gotten good stuff...I have so much good stuff, I need to give some of it away! Priceless!