Ho Ho Ho

Our Christmas celebrations were very nice.  We started them off having a nice meal on Christmas Eve at my sister Crystal's.  It was just she and her husband Jeff, and Jeff's Mom Sharon, plus Larry, Joe, Mom and I.  We just kicked back and had good conversation, then a fabulous dinner prepared by Crystal - Roast Pork with roasted potatoes and carrots, stuffing, and sourdough rolls.  It was all yummy.  Once we'd let our food digest we did a few rounds of Christmas carols, even singing the song my Grandma Hill had written years ago.  It made for a very nice celebration.

One Christmas morning we awoke and opened the presents from Santa and from one another.  This day started at 6:15 when Joey awoke and boy was he ever happy when he came out of his room to find a bicycle (or as he calls it motorcycle) from his Grandma.  He had a ball opening all his presents, and we had a ball watching him.

Then at 9:30 we headed over to Larry's parents for brunch and more gift exchanges.  We did a Dollar Store Christmas exchange which made gift giving quite a challenge for me.  Bonnie had prepared a feast for us.  Sweet Potato and sausage hash, sausage links, bacon, fried eggs, lasagna, bananna nut bread, monkey bread, fudge, candied pecans, hashbrown casserole, and I'm sure I'm missing one or two things.  All of it was delicious and of course we all overate and made ourselves miserable.

Once we'd finished eating Dad read the birth of Jesus from the Bible, and made us all get misty eyes and then he started the gift exchange off with a handmade gift for each of his children and their spouses.  He made us bread boards from the table that they had grown up with and Mom had added a poem explaining all that the table had been through on the back.  It was really beautiful and sentimental.  Larry and I loved it and used it at our Christmas dinner meal.

Then we exchanged our dollar store gifts, getting quite the ecclectic mix of things.  Mary and Eric went with a bath them for the women and cooking for the guys.  Mom and Dad went with cooking and Uncle Brian who cheated got me a 4C meassuring cup which was great cause I'd just broken ours and a candy thermometer which when I went to get mine the other day I realized had been stolen by Larry for some of his brewing experiments so it was the perfect gift.  Kellie and Chuck gave us wands and candy from the dollar store and then they too cheated and gave us personalized gifts - I got a beautiful candle warmer and Larry got a hydrometer for his brewing... at least I think that's what its called.

Joey and Elsa had so much fun opening their gifts, and then stealing the other persons that it was funny to watch.  Since we've come home Joey hasn't stopped playing with all the wonderful things that he received.  Thank you one and all for your thoughtful gifts.

On Christmas night we had Bonnie, Larry and Uncle Brian over for dinner.  Larry and I prepared a beautiful prime rib roast, mashed potatoes, carrots (that were undercooked) and greenbeans with a butter almond sauce.  It was all pretty good if I do say so myself.

Bye the end of the day I was exhausted and looking forward to bed.  Not so Joey.  It took Larry a couple of extra house to get him settled down and into sleep mode.

All in all they were wonderful holiday celebrations.