Christmas with the Engstroms

On the 26th we headed to Cedar Rapids to celebrate with Jason's family. Jason's mom Rhoda made the traditional Swedish meal that Jason talks about every year starting December 1st. Anni loved the Swedish meatballs and festive cauliflower. The food was awesome and the fellowship was even better. Anni got to run crazy and play hide and seek (their fav spot was in Grandma's pantry) with her cousins Joel and Silas.
She absolutely adores Silas and he is so sweet to her. He shares everything and give kisses freely which pleases Anni.
They even got so carried away with their hugging that the tumbled to the floor- that is some serious snuggling! Anni also loved being spoiled with attention from Aunt Annie who played hide and go seek and read books to her and Silas every second they could convince her to. Anni could not get enough! We all had fun chasing the kids, eating way too much, playing Dance, Dance, Revolution with Uncle Justin as the reigning champ (do not hate, it is a blast and you get quite a workout), game night with yelling and sweat and stress inducing favorites such as Pit and Gestures, and everyone tried their hand at Wii bowling which is actually really fun (I know, Hell must be freezing as we speak as I admit I like these video games!). We opened presents and Anni insisted on trying on one of her summer dress right at the moment: what a girl! We even got to spend some time at Jorie and Mark's new place aptly named "brown house" by Joel as they now live just down the block from Jason's parents. Jason and Justin also took it upon themselves to make the most of the tons of freshly fallen snow by building a sled course in the backyard which all enjoyed (see video for Jason's final trip down the hill). We were blessed this year to spend time with both of our families but we must say we are glad to be back at our place after almost 2 weeks of traveling!