A McVal Christmas Vacation

 I was on vacation last week!!!  

No one at my office remembered...  Well, ok... to be fair, they did and were VERY apologetic for calling me so many times each day.  Crisis arose that had NEVER reared their ugly heads before.  Why would someone TRY that the day before Christmas Eve???!  

What a mess.  I'm, at this moment, deleting over 3200 emails that the said mess generated...  ugggg....

Anyway, it was a very nice Christmas for the McVal family.  Robb and I attended/recorded the Christmas Eve service on Thursday night.

Between office calls, I managed to finish all but 1 of the sweatshirts I made for each of the kids and their loves.  And Maddy's only needed the collar and top stitching...  Got it done Saturday night.

Here is my huge mistake that I made...  I showed it to my sewing ASG group on FB and they laughed and laughed!  Then one that I go to church with asked me on Christmas Eve, "what was wrong with it?"  Ummm... it's perfectly symmetrical and the boobs are outlined...

you just can't "unsee" it.

Thankfully I had a lot of this fabric so I recut it.  Can't have Maddy be too embarrassed to wear it in public...

As per my new tradition, while I sewed I watched all the Bob Hope Christmas specials that I could find of him performing for the troops back in the 70s.  

What a bittersweet memory of watching them with my dad.

I also got the Christmas letters 95% out the door on Christmas Eve.  Whew! What a rush! I'll show you my little trick I did some other time for the return address.

We'd mailed 90% of Maddy and Matthew's gifts a week ago Saturday and they actually arrived in time!  Yay for USPS!!!  or was it UPS?  Don't remember.  It was a blur.   So Yay UPS too!  The rest of their gifts that finally got done are packaged up and waiting in the car to ship out today.

Maddy and Matthew were on the big screen, via DUO, while we opened presents on Friday morning.  

Zola is modeling the dog coat I made specifically to her measurements.  It's long enough now to cover her butt!!!  She's a LONG dog...

Robb had rigged up a camera so they could see us too, but the lens wasn't a wide lens and they could just mostly see Meri and Shub unless you sat on the ottoman and opened your gifts from them.

I walked past the camera several times, not only to show off my smashing new knit dress that is now my pjs but to check on the turkey.  SO COMFY!  I bought Meri one too so later in the day when she'd spilled something on her pretty sweater, she changed into it.

TWINSIES!

I had given Robb an indoor turkey fryer and was a bit nervous about that much hot oil in the house cooking...  Apparently the instructions were right when it said "Don't use an extension cord" because the temp didn't get past 189 before the machine just turned itself off.  Ten minutes later, it was 181...  Ummm  I need 375 before I can put the turkey in!!!  So I moved it to the hall floor and just plugged it into wall directly...  The cord is like 8 inches long. So what if it damages the floor!  

It didn't...

It turned out REALLY good.  I saved the oil and we'll be doing that again soon.

Ooh!  I got a wood chipper!!!! 

Not for this...  But for my composting efforts!!!  yay!  I'll be a homesteader yet and live off the land I tell you!!!  Well, after I get back from Wendys.

The kids liked their shirts and other items.  Shub even wore his to go visit Meri at one of her night jobs.  It was like ten degrees outside and he didn't even need a coat! 

I may lengthen the sleeves for him with a cuff or something.

 Leon wore his for a while and took it off saying, "Oooh it's WARM..."  

Here's Leon's before it was hemmed.

Will share our Christmas letter tomorrow.  I hope you had a wonderful Christmas!

Christmas lights at the end of a tunnel

 I'm starting to pull out of my doldrums... I think Christmas music helps.  

Thank the Good Lord for Michael Buble!

He is the new Dean Martin/Bing Crosby from the 70s... I love his reinvention of some of the classics and of course his originals.

Mariah Carey and Barbara Streisand don't even hold a candle to him.

And the prospect that a week from Friday, our Christmas tree will be up!  Meri, Maddy and I are planning a DUO call that day with Christmas music in the background while we decorate our own trees.  With a promise of Christmas crafts during the same call or at least soon after.

Robb has devised a Thanksgiving menu and we'll do some shopping for it tonight and probably wrap it up by this weekend.

Here it is so far...

turkey

ham

sweet potato souffle

glazed carrots

broccoli onion casserole

creamed corn

mashed potatoes

stuffing

rolls

cranberry sauce - both kinds

pumpkin pie

a variety of Walmart mini pies

relish tray. Robb suggested a "small" one. ummmm nah. it's going to have lots on it! Especially black and green olives and little dills.

It'll be a small crowd.  It could be just our household of 5 and maybe Meri and Shub, depending on Covid tests this week.

Robb's mom is still in the hospital and probably won't be home for it. Sounds like her next stop will be a nursing home for a while.

My uncle is home from the hospital now! yay!

AND I've done some sewing lately!  THAT might actually be what's making me feel better.  I haven't sewn in a long time and whenever I felt like I need to get going on sewing projects, something else came up.

But I've just completed a project that I think, instead of being for me, will be a Christmas present...  

And that opens a whole new world of projects that have to get done and now I'm overwhelmed...

sigh.

But oh well.  ON TO THE BEST SEASON OF THE YEAR!

I can't wait!

8 crazy nights!

This past week and then, some were crazy.  

What else would you expect from the McVal household?

Last week, every spare minute was spent sewing or wrapping things or cleaning.  Well, in all seriously, my cleaning stint was Friday night.

4 hours, mostly done.

On Saturday, we (Robb, Meri and I) did a day trip to my sister's house and had Christmas with my parents and extended family on my side.  It was a white elephant gift exchange.  I had a 6 cd set of Tom Petty music to give away and then a board game that I'd bought at my sister's garage sale last year, as well as an unused cake pan from Pampered Chef.  While I do love me some Tom Petty, I just don't listen to cds much anymore.  I gave my BIL the heads up that he'd appreciate that one, so the stealing gifts got real...  and he loved it!

A mini talent show with just my nephew participating.  

I spent all of one direction of this day trip sticking on labels and writing addresses onto all the Christmas letters.  They may get mailed today...  I'm a little behind this year...

We got home in time to finish wrapping, changing sheets, cleaning and a hundred other things and looked like we were enjoying a quiet evening in a beautifully decorated home by the time Meri arrived with her dog and a little while later, Maddy and Matthew arrived with their dog.  

So 3 goldens back in da house for the weekend!  

The dogs had a blast.  

Meri did Maddy's hair in an updo for Christmas Eve.  She's the master!

We hustled home from church and a quick stop at the store on Sunday in time for Ryan, Jen and Leon to show up for our Christmas lunch and gift opening.  Wrapping paper flew and the once clean and tidy house went immediately back from whence it came.  Kind of like Cinderella at midnight.

When anybody ran out of gifts and it was their turn to open one, I threw them a little wrapped gift.  This was Robb's idea.  Wrap up 20 individually wrapped men's tube socks as overflow gifts.  The kids loved them and tried to put on as many as they got.

They also decorated a ton of cookies that Maddy and Meri made.  Maddy had had a cookie decorating craft with her kindergartners last week and had lots of sprinkles and bottles of frosting left over.  BRING THEM TO IOWA! She said!  and she did.

Leon had a blast putting a pound of sprinkles of whichever ones he could get his hands on.

We had time to get over to see my bestie at the nursing home too.  Maddy and Matthew hadn't seen them in a while.

The afternoon was spent playing board games and Robb watched from the kitchen as he made several shepherd pies with tator tots on top (instead of mashed patatoes) for the dinner that night. I did a LOT of dishes...

When dinner time rolled around, the 2nd shift of guests arrived.  Robb's brother and his family and his dog.   More games and visiting.  

 Monday morning, Maddy and Matthew had to leave with Duke.  Darn!  She had to help out with the Christmas Eve children's service back in Wisconsin.   

I made 3 gallons of MinuteMaid Lemonade in our big beverage server and added a quarter gallon of cranberry juice to it.  It turned a lovely shade of dull pink.  I had to add more lemonade mixture to it to get rid of the over tart flavor but then it was delish!  Everyone worked on that all day and I had to make 2 more gallons on Christmas day.  It was a hit.

We just left that on the counter for everyone to help themselves.

Another niece and her husband arrived with their dog.  So at one point, Monday, we had 6 dogs in the house and none of them got along real well with each other.  So I banished ours to the laundry room with a gate so they can see all the activity and beg for scraps from afar.  They were not hurting!

Another BIL and his wife showed up for lunch with all of us.  Sloppy Joes!  YUMMO. They brought a saran wrap game and I won a LOAD of little gifts!  

The best being the $5 bill at the tail end!  WOOHOO!!!

And to always improve on any story you tell that seems to be a dud, you end it with "and then I found $5".  That always grabs people's attention and makes it a great story.

But then Steve and wife needed to leave so the household just rolled back to duller roar.

Robb took Leon down to his mom's that afternoon on Christmas Eve and got back in time to attend church with Meri and me.  Then we headed home to enjoy a soup supper with the rest of the clan.  We had chili, potato soup and Jacki made Chicken Tortellini soup.  I'm stuffed again just thinking about it.  I had a bowl of each.

CHRISTMAS DAY

Robb's sister arrived with her family and thankfully no more pets.  They got here early, like at 7am and thought they'd find us asleep.  HA!  Robb had been up since 3, gotten the turkey into the smoker at 4:30 and was just enjoying some of the 24 hour A Christmas Story movie.  I came down about 15 minutes later than Cathy arriving.  Another niece and company arrived by 1 and we enjoyed a fancy, table cloth ridden dinner with all the fixings.  Ham, turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, cream cheesed corn, cream cheesed broccoli, (do you see a theme), cranberry jelly (sans cream cheese - although that could be yummy too...hmmm.) and tons of other food.  The remainder without cream cheese.  I even pulled out another table and lowered it to the height of our dining room table to give it an extra two seats.  

Yep - 13 people around that table without a single ladies table in sight.  And my knees got the metal poles on the extended table bit.  sigh.  Oh well, it was easier to get up and grab things we forgot, like the mashed potatoes in the microwave, etc.

Just before lunch, I found our that the BIL and his family had to leave by 2pm.  Yikes!  We hadn't even opened presents yet!  So as soon as it looked like people's eating was dying down, I made the decree that we leave the table as it is and go in and unwrap presents.  The younger set was DOWN with this!  

They played Meri's vampire game.  Unfortunately they had to stop and no one won.  Not even the vampire.

So that happened.  

Like my hat?

Got that BIL and his family out right at the stroke of 2 with individually wrapped tiny pie in each of their hands.  Walmart's mini pies are the best!  Niece left at the same time.

So we were left with SIL and her husband and daughter.  Everyone except Robb and I took a nap.  I got my second wind and did the dishes again.  I think that was 17 times since Friday.  My hands are dry and cracked, but my fingernails look divine.

We played one of Meri's games that she got for Christmas that involves everyone but her, wearing black out sunglasses.  The Stevie Wonder jokes ensued, until Meri said SSHHH!  She was a vampire in the game and had to explain how to play.  

I've noticed that when one sense is cut off, other senses become more acute.  Like noticing when someone is attempting to sneak put away leftovers from supper.  KNOCK THAT OFF!  I still have peripheral vision!  So yeah, my super power of getting perturbed easier is much stronger with those glasses!  I may not be allowed to wear them any longer.

I don't mind help from some people, but others, I cannot deal with their help at all.  It seems judgy.

Wow, I don't think I should even be allowed to think about those glasses!

Leon was home briefly and then left again with his dad and Jen.  They're house sitting for several days, so I probably won't see him again til early next week.

Meri took pics of her cousin in front of the Christmas tree and I worked on a puzzle with Cathy for a while and visited with everyone within sight.  

But then Robb got a text that put everything into perspective and we left everyone there and hit the road.  Someone needed assistance and who are we to say no?  Especially on Christmas Day?...  

Looking back now, the black out glasses worked overtime even though I wasn't wearing them as I wasn't too thankful for the emergency at the time.  I'm actually still grumbling about it a little, but I'll get over it with enough Christmas music.  That tends to cheer me up.    

So today, I'm back to work and getting to sit down.  WHEW!  And most of the house looks like this.  

I think I know how I'll be spending my lunch break today...

Merry Christmas!

Bouncing Bumbles, He's a Dear!

I've lost the advent calendar with pockets from last year...  It is NOT with my Christmas things and probably under a box in my closet. WAY in the back...  But I'm sure I looked there too.

Oh well...  Leon was happy with the little gifts that I WOULD have put in the pockets this morning.  An 18 piece Lego set to make a tiny little kid holding a balloon.  It was a mystery pack so who knew what was in there.  When I saw the balloon, I said, "Please don't let it be the clown from IT..."

Thankfully no! whew.

I also gave him a light up Rudolph nose and it fit the theme of breakfast.  We were watching the old clay-mation version of it on TV while eating.

Rudolph saves Christmas!  Who knew??!

and BUMBLES BOUNCE!

 I'm sure Leon was wondering how he could be a hero with that nose but all he came up with was to talk about putting it on Great Grandma M's dog's nose and letting him lead the sleigh this year..

I'm not going to wear a nose that's been on a dog.

Also Leon, who makes his own cell phones, tablets, computer mice and pokemon toys simply using paper and colored pencils.  

Multi faceted boy, that one...

And he is my heart.

Letters from the edge

Dear Readers,

It was SO dark just a few minutes before I headed out to the bus stop with Leon this morning.  It lightened up JUST a little but I can't imagine standing out there in the dark, waiting for the bus.  It's time for the time change, huh...

I saw that Massachusetts voted to not do the time change anymore.  Wow... 

Below is what I'm making currently.  The other project with the strips of upholstery fabric is on hold as I don't think it can be completed by Christmas.  At least not in the condition I would like it in.  Still thinking on that.  But in the meanwhile, Leon had asked for one of these quite a while ago, so I'm attempting it for a Christmas gift for him.

I found a bin at Walmart of Fleece throws for $2.50 a piece and they were in the gray and blue.  Exact shades as this!  What luck!  With remnants from former projects, this will cost me maybe $3.50 to make.  Woohoo! 

This is what it currently looks like so far.

I've made a pattern, just a smidge narrower than the original.  And will make it again with mermaid type things for a gift this year for another child if it turns out.

I just need to figure out how to do the teeth so they won't be poky and judging from the looks of the original, the teeth need to be sewn in first.  I'm thinking lots of large squares of single layer super thick fleece?...  Those teeth look like 90 degree angles, right?

I'm planning on going to see my parents this weekend to celebrate my dad's upcoming birthday.  AND planning on singing a LOT on the drive.  If my cold doesn't hinder my voice... 

Have a great weekend!
Love McVal

Who did it better?

Does anyone else love Better Off Dead more than me?  

I didn't think so...

IF you saw that movie, do you remember Ricky's Christmas present to Monique?

lol!  We quote this movie a lot...

Gee Ricky... I'm really sorry your mom blew up...

 

 YOU know!... The interNATIONAL language... LOVE!

Two dollars...

First, we have: Frawnch fries. And: Frawnch dressing. And: Frawnch bread. 

And to drink: Ta-da! Peru.

Anyway, it's Robb's sister's birthday soon and he got her an electronic picture frame. 

It's fully loaded...

If you get my drift...

 

She is going to just die...

Sew Wired...

So far, it has been a crafty week!  Maddy and Meri finished up some wedding invites and mailed the remainders off.  

LAST night, Maddy, Meri and I worked on making these special hangers for gifts for certain people.

We're about half way done.  We're using this as a tutorial for it.  

By the time we reach the last one, we'll finally get the hang of it.

Get it?? Get it??

HANG??  HANGERS??

nevermind.

And Maddy super glued her fingers together by accident.

Adventures every minute around here!!!

Also yesterday, Maddy and I talked throughout my entire lunch break and laid out all the plans for the wedding that we've got together so far.  So far so good!!!  And the logs that I brought back from my sister's house this past weekend will NOT get cut.  Mabs has other plans for them.

I would still like to get my chain saw working though.  We do need more chunks of wood for our other projects and table centerpieces.

It's getting down to the wire now....

A Fish Called Makiah

What a fun evening!  I had all of my kids under one roof, along with a grandkid AND a future son-in-law.  What more could I ask for?  Meri finally made it home after trying out for the spring play and the other kids were chomping at the bit to open their presents.  

Waiting patiently...

We started out with the stockings and then the youngest opening a present as we went around the room one present at a time.  It's always fun when you get the kids the exact same thing for one of their gifts and each act like they never guessed!

Each read their Groundhog Day mug individually when it was their turn to open.

I have that quote engrained in my brain now...

"I'll give you a winter prediction: It's gonna be cold, it's gonna be grey and it's gonna last you for the rest of your life."

But then Meri had to run off to a work Christmas party and the wrapping paper had taken over the room.  What had taken hours to wrap carefully had taken a mere hour to totally trash the living room.  Oh well.  It's been done before and nothing a garbage bag can't handle!

Leon opened a fish tank and fish from Meri and he was over joyed!  "A FISH!!!  JUST WHAT I WANTED!" (he did say that about the underwear I gave him too...)  but it really was what he wanted.  He'd been asking for a fish for a while now and Meri finally got me to cave.  

When he was asked what he'd named it, I was expecting him to make up a crazy made up non-remembering type of name, but nope.

He said, "I'll call her Makiah."  His best friend's name.

I guess it's better than a fish called Wanda.

Well, I've got the next three work days off and have lots of activities planned.  I'll post Robb's Christmas letter before Sunday.  Have a wonderful Christmas!

Rub A Dub Dub Tree Skirt

Friday night, I scrambled to get the bridal shower gift ready to ship off on Saturday, the day of the shower.  Yep - I'm on TOP of things!!!  

Saturday morning, I got it photographed and boxed up.  As I labeled it, I took another look at the invitation.  The shower is NEXT Saturday...  Hmm..  I guess I didn't have to ask USPS to turn back time after all!

I did forget to stick the shower card inside the package...  sigh.  Week early, card short.

And if my dear sweet sister will NOT tell or share this post with her future daughter-in-law, I will show you what I made.  

I'm going with an Amish theme for this Christmas Tree skirt.  They leave in at least one mistake because no one is perfect!  I left just enough to leave no doubt.  And probably a few threads here and there...  Hopefully no pins.  But it does have a one year old's butt print on it.  oops.

Then on Saturday, I had found a Freecycle.org post about someone giving away a TON of stuff and only between the hours of 10 - 4 on Saturday.  They were cleaning out their barn or garage or some such thing and just wanted to put everything out for people to take during just that time.  Cool!  They listed a bunch of what they had, including a cast iron claw footed bathtub, Tonka toys, theatre chairs, etc.  Meri set her sights on the tub...  REALLY???  

So after we had spent the earlier part of the day purchasing literally tons of groceries, we headed out to find this mystical farm where they give things away.  

Found it...  After getting lost on ill marked gravel roads for over 30 minutes.  

Oh and the giveaway was on Sunday, not Saturday.  I was wrong.  Full car, day early.  I was really hoping that by being late, the tub would have been gone...  So much for being lost!

The lady said that since we were there, to take whatever we wanted!  Well, Meri wanted the bath tub and I wasn't going to argue with her in front of a couple strangers.  Although looking back now, that would have been easier than moving that behemoth into our garage!  And Sonya and Alisa wonder how my garage fills up...

We unloaded most of the groceries onto their yard before loading it, then piled everything in around.  I have a station wagon type car...  Leon just patted it from his seat and pushed the packets of toilet paper and diapers out of his way so he could see the movie screen and kept munching away on his fruit snacks.

I got the Tonka toys too.  They need cleaning up but Leon will love them next spring in the sandbox!

Meri's idea for the bath tub...  She wants to paint it all sorts of funky colors and put it in her bedroom, probably under her lofted bed.  Fill it with pillows and cushions and have a little reading nook for herself and Leon, with possibly a great place for Leon during sleepovers.  One of the 2nd grade teachers had something like this in their classroom and Meri had LOVED it.

Robb and Ryan weren't as thrilled with the idea and my hands and arms still hurt from moving it from the car to the garage last night.  I thought I was having a heart attack.  The tingling feeling is leaving my arms today, but last night they weren't feeling so hot.

During the afternoon, after we sifted all the groceries into the kitchen and sworn about the tub, I got several pizza crusts ready to roll.  Maddy and three of her closest and dearest college buds drove in around 4:30pm!  They weren't here really to see us.  We were just a place to fill up with supper and get gas.  Not at the same time.  We fed them and visited and in a whirlwind suddenly they'd left!   Maddy was wanting to see her old high school's fall play and had brought the other girls to help her stay awake during the superdy duper day trip.

That night I got to sew.  I made a sample top out of some muslin for my DATE night next week.  It fit pretty well, after guessing the next size up on the pattern.  Don't you hate it when the pattern is too small but you're determined to make it work anyway?  I'll tell you more about the project later in the week.  Currently I'm trying to make the button hole guide be the facing...  Don't ask yet...  Just roll your eyes and roll with it.

Sunday...  That will be tomorrow!  I'm tired of typing and my hands are tingling.

Happy Veteran's day to all the brave men and women who have kept and are keeping our country safe!  Thank you for all your service!  I'm planning on attending the program at the middle school today.  Meri has a prominent role!!  Have a great day!

Sew what?!

Got some sewing in this weekend, but it wasn't the Sweetheart Ball dress at all.  I've got a wedding of a niece/Godchild coming up and I hadn't made anything for her yet!  So after agonizing in my sewing stash for over an hour, settled on this for a table runner.  It's reversible and you can kind of see the pattern on the back.  It looks a little rough here...  but I'll finish stitching and iron it again before I wrap it up!

If you remember, I made a table runner for my nephew that got married in October and Robb dubbed it Sam's Quilt because it was really long and skinny.  His wife now calls it that!

The table runner for Abby is much smaller and should fit any table nicely without draping over the ends.  I'm sewing the edge binding on by hand because I kind of suck at machine sewing it on and can make the stitches hide if I do it by hand.  And since it's reversible, I don't want it to show on either side.

I hope she and her husband likes it!

Two Birds... What to do with them?

You're probably wondering what I mean by two birds... Love birds?  In the hand??  Bush??  Killing them with one stone?? 

Yeah - birds have been around...  In this case, I'm killing two birds with one stone.  They very well could be love birds, as this is for a wedding gift! 

But it's also for my sewing group challenge!  At the last sewing meeting in May or June, someone was giving away a bunch of sample books of fabric.  Some decorator, some just frilly curtain samples, some silky stuff.  The challenge was to see what creative things we would all do with what we took.  And there was a lot to choose from from the free table that day with these samples...

Monday, mid afternoon, I finally got some time (from a three day weekend) to get some sewing done.  Maddy had blown into the room and said, HEY!  Let's all 3 of us make headbands!!!  So Mads, Mer and I went and dug through my stash to get inspired for headbands.  The girls picked out some decorator fabric and I came across a booklet of samples all stapled together that happened to be from the group challenge.  cool... 

Although Meri told me later that she had taken those samples...  and she wanted them back...  Ummm.. They're already into a project....  So nope!

You know a couple weeks ago, I was going to make a Christmas tree skirt for my nephew and his bride's wedding in October...  The red stuff I'd pulled out that I was going to make it with just wasn't working...  So I decided to try it with these new fabric bits instead.  Out of each sample, I cut the same sized square and then cut them in half, making little stacks of the various fabric on my table. 

Sewed them together end to end and made 4 long strips.  The iron was HOT!  After seeing that I didn't have enough for a tree skirt, I changed my gears and aimed for a table runner instead.    Staggered the sections so you wouldn't see that they're not all EXACTLY the same size and wouldn't have to fit corners to corners...  I kind of suck at that...

Backed it with some denim that wrapped around to make a border and it's done!  One wedding gift...  Ready for the challenge in a couple weeks and for a wedding in a couple months!  Whew!  Plus it gave my creative bits a workout!

I needed that....

It's for a long table apparently...  Robb thought it was a skinny quilt for my nephew.  He's very slender...

:)  I needed a laugh too...

Glazed Over Hams

I hope you all had a wonderful weekend! Here is my recap of the weekend, in full detail, so grab you coffee and pull on your reading glasses. Let's begin...

Friday. I had to work until 5. Had an interesting conversation with my boss that included "Jesus Christ, Superstar", the weather and pigs.

After 5pm, all of Robb's side of the family started to arrive. We had a soup supper and opened gifts. Each family received a game of Quelf from Grandma. We're all big game people so when the wrapping paper all hit the floor, a bunch of them dug into the game. That's when we noticed some of the games were marked "family" and some were marked "adult". My MIL was horrified thinking that the adult game would require nudity. We assured her that it was just more geared towards grown ups and was just harder than the family version.

But now, about 8 games into the family edition, I'm thinking the adult version probably does lean more towards nudity... My personal family did NOT get the adult version. WHEW! One of the cards already told me to do a belly dance and show my belly skin... I can only imagine what the adult version has in it... Thank you Carma for your belly dancing tips!!! In another game I had to wear one of the Taekwondo helmets and sit under the table for a while. What a weird but fun game!

Come Saturday morning, there was only one family who stayed over. The girls and I went shopping and I finished up all the personal family gifts that we'd be unwrapping on Sunday. Went home and a sister-in-law and her family came back for the afternoon. She helped wrap and mostly gabbed with Maddy and I as we wrapped. That night was my churches Christmas Eve service. Kind of quiet, since most families were out of town. Went back on Christmas morning to church and there was a more substantial crowd. Meri and Maddy got presents from Grandpa Dale! (A guy at church who was once mistaken as Robb's father and the kids jokingly gave him their Christmas lists... Meri got a pony (toy) and Maddy got a coffee single)
After church we headed home to get the big Christmas dinner prepared. Turkey, ham, jellied cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes and gravy, green beans, broccoli/onion casserole, stuffing with cranberries and hardly anyone ate dessert. Which is probably a blessing because my last minute no bake pies came out awful.

After Robb's brother and his family left for their next leg of the Christmas tour, our personal family had our Christmas. I asked Robb to read the Christmas story from the Bible before we began. He turned around and found Luke 2 on Biblegateway.com and apparently it has a read-to-me function now. In the voice of Nigel from my GPS, we were read the Christmas story. Ah technology... It really needs a tweaking. I had to stop him when it got into the circumcision part... and then had to explain "kind of" what that was to my 11 year old...We started from the youngest to the oldest and everyone opened their presents one at a time with everyone watching.Then we kind of vegged the rest of the day and evening. Some of us played new games that we got. From Kshotz, we got a game called Tell Tale. SO fun! It's a stack of cards with various pictures on them. As you lay down the card, you have to tell part of story, then it's the next players turn. They lay down one of their cards (without knowing what they're going to lay down) and have to continue on with your story. It goes back and forth and pretty soon you're in a desert and a girl in a bikini and surf board show up! VERY unpredictable on where these stories end up! Thank you K! Meri is getting very good at improv. Later on the girls and I watched part of Love Actually.

Monday we all kind of did our own thing. I finally had a chance to examine my gifts. I got a necklace and earring set from Meri, a pair of mocs from Mad, to name a couple. I also received a Bluetooth for my cell phone and that in itself will save me lots of money on Chiropractic visits! I also got a large print Bible, a hoody sweater, cookbook and a red union suit to name a few more gifts. I've never had long johns before! Can't wait until it's cold enough to use them!

That afternoon we all went to a matinee and then a couple stores for the kids to use a couple of their various gift cards. Ryan and Tiffany saw The Darkest Hour and the rest of us saw We Bought A Zoo. That was a lot better than I thought it was going to be.

And today I'm back in my office, looking miserably around. It looks like a few elves had a knock down, drag out fight in here. I need a garbage bag. and I look forward to my next three day weekend coming up...

How was your Christmas?