A wonderful night!

I wanted to tell everyone about my night, while my heart is still so full.

Kacy and her girls had planned a Christmas party, and had asked us more than a month ago to save tonight. The guest list was "the girls" (also known as "the singing Bridesmaids"), Kahla's sister-in-law Tenille (whom we've known since grade school), and all of their mothers and sisters. Well, it turned out to be much more than just a Christmas party.

When we got there, we sat around visiting and eating the yummy stuff they'd made. (The girls had met several times to plan, and had done all the cleaning, planning, baking, etc.) They had us decorate some ornaments... I was determined to recreate the entire nativity in glue and glitter. They didn't believe I could. They were right. While we were busy, the girls left for a minute, and then Kacy came in and told us that even though they'd told us it was just a Christmas party, that wasn't really true. They wanted to honor their mothers. They had decided to do this last summer at one of Jessica's bridal showers. They decided that their own mothers deserved a shower. (All of us but one have married off a daughter or son in the last two years, and the one remaining will be doing it soon.)

Then the other girls came down the stairs, each carrying a vase of flowers. The flowers were the same (or as close as they could get) to the flowers that were in our weddings. We moved into the living room, and they brought out our wedding albums. (Those thieves!) They gave each of us someone else's album, and, at their request, we took turns asking each other questions about the wedding, and what we remembered. We were all married within a span of about five years, so it was really fun to look at the pictures and talk about it. The girls just drank it all in.

Then they had us draw questions out of a bag, and answer them... it was things like "What is the best part of being a mother?" "What has been your greatest challenge as a mother?" "What one thing could you not live without?" "What was your best vacation?" Some were "light" and some were thought-provoking. Between each thing, they gave us each little door prizes... candles, nail polish, bath stuff... just sweet gifts.

Then they went and got some other boxes, and made us all open them together. I could tell they were excited about it, because they all had their cameras out, haha. Each daughter (or sister group) bought their mother some lingerie! It was so fun and sweet. (Mine RAWKS, btw. My girls know me.) There were several other gifts... my girls gave me Bath and Body Works "Vanilla Bean Noel" lotion and shower gel... I love that stuff! We took a ton of pictures, did a lot of laughing and hugging, and just had a great time.

Jessica, one of the girls, lives in Arizona now... she's only here in town for 3 nights. I know that those girls would have rather spent time with just them, catching up, laughing, spending time together with their best friends. I was already moved that they'd included their moms and sisters, and then it turns out that they instead turned the whole focus onto us, and let us know in a very special way how much they love us.

I'll share some pictures of the night, although they really don't do it justice.