Jonas's first Christmas

We were so happy that Jonas arrived before Christmas. And, after knowing how long his labor took, very glad we didn't opt to schedule our induction for Christmas Eve, which was one of our options!

We exchanged gifts with Darby's parents on the Friday night after we got home from the hospital. They returned to Waco on Saturday, and Darby's mom came back for a longer visit on New Year's Day. I'll post more about that later.

My parents and Hannah were with us the entire week of Christmas. And Matt and his fiance, Leila, were able to come over quite a bit. They all showered Jonas with plenty of snuggles. It was great that Jonas had so much time to spend with his G-ma, Papa, and aunt and uncle.

"Aunt-elect" Leila

Snoozing with Auntie Hannie

Uncle Matt

Papa

G-ma

Unfortunately, Darby and I came down with a stomach bug on the Monday and Tuesday before Christmas, so we were pretty ragged. I was disappointed to have to miss out on our Christmas Eve pizza dinner and game playing. Darby did cheer me up by bringing me my stocking in bed. We got Jonas his own stocking, but we didn't fill it this year. We figured he wouldn't appreciate it. :)

Hannah and her boyfriend, Brad, staged a photo shoot with Jonas. We're using some of the pictures for our birth announcement.

He wasn't thrilled about being stuffed in his stocking.

Looking cute in his Christmas outfit.

We were both feeling better on Christmas Day, so we enjoyed opening presents with my family. Jonas slept through the whole event.

Darby and I always take a picture in front of our tree. It was so fun to add Jonas this year!

My mom's extended family came into town on Thursday night, so we headed over to Aunt Lea's for dinner and frousin time. Jonas got to meet his great-grandma Katherine, great-aunt Katina, and frousins Amy, Rob, and Matthew. Naturally, on his first evening out, Jonas went through the outfit he had on and his back-up outfit. Luckily, Aunt Katina let him open his Christmas gift early, so he didn't have to be naked the whole night. And we learned an important lesson: the diaper bag is now stocked with two backup outfits.

Great-aunt Lea

Great-aunt Katina

Great-grandma Katherine

Frousin Amy

On Friday morning, we went back over to Lea's to open gifts and have our traditional Christmas lunch. Again, Jonas slept through all of the present opening, and he didn't even say thank you to anyone! Normally, we all get together on Christmas Day in Dallas, but everyone agreed to change up the date and location, so Darby, Jonas, and I could participate. I'm so grateful to everyone for being so accommodating.

A Baby's First Christmas ornament. Jonas seems thrilled by his presents. :)

There are a lot of benefits of having a baby around Christmas. The primary one for us being that Darby is off work for several weeks. And I love that our families were able to spend so much time with him right after birth. But, to be honest, I found it a little overwhelming to handle both a newborn and the holidays at the same time. Normally, I love Christmas, but I just felt like I couldn't totally enjoy it this year. I felt like I missed out on things because I had to excuse myself to feed Jonas every few hours. Both Darby and I have the feeling that Christmas just didn't really happen this year. So, while Jonas's first Christmas was certainly special, I'm looking forward to his second Christmas when I'll hopefully be a little less zombie-like.

Christmas-ed out.