Christmas in Marietta

"Happy people roll with the punches. They know from experience that everything changes."

And so it was with the Chanon family Christmas.

On Saturday night, December 22nd (the night before we planned to leave for Charlotte), Bailey was acting extremely lethargic.  it just so hapened to be that Uncle Schmidty was coming over to visit and once Bailey saw him, he got up and collapsed immediately.  So ten minutes into his visit, Schmidty helped Paul load Bailey into the car to go to the emergency vet.

It turns out that Bailey had a tumor on his spleen that had ruptured and was lethargic due to low blood pressure from internal bleeding.  The doctors kept him overnight with plans to take out his slpeen in the morning.  All went well with the surgery and Bailey was scheduled to come home Christmas Day.

The next morning, after Paul told his family the news, they decided to come to Marietta to celebrate as a family.  Because of them, we ended up having the family Christmas that we were planning on...and even though we thanked them, it will never seem like enough.

• Amanda and Dave had just arrived in Charlotte from Ft. Lauderdale THAT MORNING and had to jump in the car for an additional four hour car ride with a 4 and 2 year old.  

• Andrew and Vicki loaded up their 6 month old and two dogs and drove 7 hours from Raleigh to Marietta.

• Jane and John, who had been shopping, wrapping, planning and cooking for probably two months loaded up everything into their car to drive down here.

And that is what family is all about.

Ella and Claire arrived first and settled right into the routine.  It is crazy to see how much they have grown up since their last visit just four months ago!

I think that this picture sequence says it all....

These girls do love each other....no doubt about it.

And the only thing that could take their attention away from playing was the newest addition to the Chanon family, Tyler.

When the girls weren't loving baby Tyler, we made food for the reindeer and sprinkled it outside...

Made cookies and set them out for Santa...

Tracked Santa using http://www.noradsanta.org...

Read Twas the Night Before Christmas...

But most off all, we enjoyed spending time together as a family

When Christmas Day finally arrived, the kids were ready to go!

I hope that you all had a Merry Merry Christmas!  Here's to a wonderful 2013!