A Love that Grows Stronger: Hansen Family Christmas

I come from an extremely large family. Both of my parents are the second of 6 kids. I have something close to 30 first cousins and many aunts and uncles. Family get togethers are always a bunch of fun and there is NEVER a dull moment. I am also fortunate enough to have a pretty close relationship and bond with almost all of my cousins, aunts uncles and grandparents. The cousins that are close to my age I talk to on a fairly frequent basis and this has only further increased since having Lincoln. Many of them are already mother's themselves so they are the first ones I go to with questions.

Unfortunately my mom's side of the family is in Northwest Indiana which is about 2-3 hours from here. We don't usually stay the night up there because there isn't always enough room. Especially not now with Lincoln. But we do get to spend several hours together when we do, and I wouldn't trade it for the world.

Well the sunday after I started work, and the day after the Chafin family Christmas we went up north to celebrate Christmas with my Mom's side of the family. We used to get together on Christmas day every year but this year we thought we'd try something different since extended families are getting bigger and bigger. This was our first crack at it and I have to say it was a success.

It was also the first time some of my cousins were able to meet Lincoln. Unfortunately with the timing of his birth around holidays and things and the drive with several of them was too much to take on to get a chance to meet him, so for some of them it was their first time. I just have to say that I love my family and I love even more how much they love my little man.

my cousin Katie meeting Lincoln for the first time

miss allison

my cousin Aspen. he is so good with him!

my cousin jeanette with payton

my cousin joey with Lincoln for the first time

Joe with Payton and Lincoln

opening presents

Allison, Hannah, Aspen and Aubry

Aubry

There are 3 of us cousins who have children. My cousin Jeanette was the first she had Madison who is almost 5! Then she has twin girls Allison and Aubry who happen to be 1 month younger than Hannah. Hannah is my cousin Marianne's oldest little girl. Marianne had another baby girl 6.5 weeks after Lincoln was born. So thats a grand total of 6 great grandkids with Lincoln being the only boy! Below is the picture with all 6 of them and Baba and Zedo (grandma and grandpa in Slovak, which is what nationality my grandma is.)

all the great grandkids

4 generations

Little Payton is just 6.5 weeks younger than Lincoln. I thought it would be fun to see how different their sizes are. Payton was 9lbs 6 oz when she was born and I think Lincoln was only about 12 lbs at this point.