Only a Month Ago...(or so!)

Christmas Eve was finally here....We celebrated at my brother's house which is just one of my most favorite places to be during the holidays. Everywhere you turn, every nook and cranny has been decorated with darling snowmen, Santas, garland and candles. There's a fire burning, candles glowing, music, and of course the best meals and tastiest treats...they define AWDIWOD (anything worth doing, is worth over-doing!) and I just love it! This year we began the evening with the traditional dancing through the house...We worked up our appetites and quickly filled our bellies with the most amazing ham, potatoes, Swedish meatballs, delicious salad etc...taking a short breather, we all met in the music room to sing carols. No Christmas Eve would be complete without shepherds, wise men and of course, Mary, Joseph and Baby Jesus. This year we had two angels and just one wise man, but they were all fabulous and did a great job! The kids got to listen to a great story, while Brady practically emptied the candy jar! (he IS my son...and has the sweet-tooth to prove it!) There were a few presents to open before we finally had a little more room for dessert! Kacey filled up her own Sampler Platter! Turned out her eyes were a little bigger than her belly and, darn it, Mom had to help finish them up! There were several platters of delicious cookies, bowls full of peppermint ice cream and Grandma's hot fudge, boxes of divine chocolates and Dave's most amazing rice pudding! Yeah, we were all moving a little slower after all of that!
We said our good-byes and headed home to "Jump in bed cover up your head cause Santa Claus comes tonight..." or so they hoped! A couple of these kids were having a hard time getting along with each other this year, and responded to threats of no presents with..."Oh yeah? Well last year we were way worse and Santa still brought us tons of stuff!" Hmmmm...so yeah, he showed up, but with a lot less than last year! They woke to find Lazar Light Blasters, Nerf*guns, Lego*s, trains, tracks, books, fashion sketch pads, smelly pencils (those are SO yummy! even better than the markers we had as kids!) and even a Nintendo*DS! Yeah, I think they did OK...for bein' bad!




And yes, only on Christmas morning are massive candy canes perfectly acceptable for breakfast! The rest of the day was spent playing with all the loot, taking treats to neighbors and pretty much just relaxing and enjoying the day! We had my parents over for a simple Pot Roast (with way too many carrots!) and a few more cookies, then I was up entirely too late getting ready for round two... Completely exhausted, after averaging 4 hours of sleep each night for the month of December, I went to work at 6am the next morning; got home around 1:30pm, wrapped the last 2 presents, packed up the kids, loaded up the car and headed up to do it all again with the in-laws! I slept most of the way there and back, got over 9 hours that night, and felt much better by Monday!
There were more angels, shepherds, wise men and yes, another Mary, Joseph and Baby Jesus. More Transformer*s, trains, outfits, Samba*s and even a Girraffe puff ball!
And most importantly, more Grandma and Grandpa time, and lots and lots of cousins!!!
So another Christmas has come and gone...and now we enter those bleak winter months where all we can do is just bundle up, do a lot of house cleaning and hope to make it until Spring!