Christmas!!

Christmas was far better than I expected this year. I've had enough crummy Christmases that I worried. Nope. This one was good. Starting with waffles and cartoons Christmas Eve morning. Plus some yoga and housecleaning (sadly, the vacuum cleaner broke halfway through the first room -- humbug).

The evening was spent with my favorite cousins. Hooray!!

Nativity populated entirely with tiny humans for the first time since my brothers and I were kids.
Finally!!

Uncle Martin does a great job narrating

This tiny babe was everyone's favorite. Her mom even let me hold her for a little bit.
There is no sadness in the world that holding a tiny baby can't cure.

My nieces and nephew are the coolest.
(Also, they remind me a lot of their dad. A LOT.)

Aaron played guitar while his girlfriend Anna sang. She has a lovely voice. He is smitten.

My cousin Bryce invited a girl for the first time ever. Isn't she pretty? Doctor, too.
We're trying not to be too pushy ;)

There's a reason I look forward to seeing these people. And talking with them.

Relationship goals 

Taking sweater cutes from my mom

Christmas morning, Dave and I ate breakfast with Mom and Dad, then spent a few hours helping Mom prep for the big afternoon meal so that Mom wouldn't have to worry about it when everyone else arrived to open presents. Dad took the opportunity to remove snow for the second time that morning. Hooray for new snow on Christmas!

Perfect American breakfast for the perfect American family (2 kids - one boy and a girl. If only, Dave!)

Mom says this is the first time the money bread has ever come out of the pan perfectly.
Had to document it!

When it came time to open my gifts, I was far more spoiled than I ever expected. My parents are so generous to all of us. I don't deserve them.

Dad gave all the families a package with chicken sausage and ham. He also gifted us with Red Lobster biscuit mix, campfire roasting sticks, puffy vests for the boys, and sweaters for the girls. My dad is a true original, and sweetly thoughtful.

Mom made PJ a Busy Book. She said she made most of it up, so she'll never be able to recreate it. I may make her try to recreate it for me anyway ;)

A package of Red Vines bigger than Dave's head. Haha!

Now for some gorgeous shots of children:

This little guy wasn't feeling very well, but it didn't keep him from eating most of a package of graham crackers

The girls had quite the group of helpers to put together their new Lego sets

Mom's turkey dinner was delicious, and I especially love cherry pie

I stayed up past midnight and listened to as many Christmas songs on FM100.3 as I could before they clicked off. This year, they kept playing Christmas songs through the next day. Haha! I'm so glad. I love Christmas music. I wish it played a little longer every year. I will listen to "Feliz Navidad" over and over and over again as long as they will let me.

I hope you all had a very Merry Christmas. I know I did!

A pathetic potluck

The past two years, my company sent my coworkers and I to Tucanos for our annual Christmas lunch.  This was already a downgrade from the breakfast -- for us and our families -- and gift certificates they did the first couple of years I worked there.

This year, we had a potluck. Apparently we blew our budget on the summer party.

When the time came to start our Christmas party this is what the food table looked like:

I brought the vegetables

The saddest potluck you ever saw.

The irony is that we've had quite a few fun potlucks in the last six months or so. But, either because the power went out the day before and everyone worked from home so we missed the signups, or we just couldn't believe this was our real party. Those of us who came sat around for a while and watched QVC in the break room. Others gave up and went out to lunch (one guy snuck out to see Star Wars). After an hour another coworker came with a bunch of different options for soup. They were quite tasty!

The head honchos were kind enough to send a gift-wrapping service to us. I only had 6 gifts, so it didn't do me a ton of good. Although, I like the paper they offered. One of my coworkers -- the one that snuck out -- had about 50 gifts. Apparently, when his wife heard about the deal she sent all of the kids gifts. He had them all on a two-decker trolley. Smart guy. Smart wife.

But, you know, after the parties we've had in the past, the potluck felt a little like a diss from corporate.

Hopefully next year will be better. Ah, well, as a wise woman once said, "A terrible party makes for a good story!"

Vanity shoot

Ever since Melissa made me the beautiful gown for 1776, I fantasized about having my friend Mandie at Illumine Photography take some professional shots of me in wearing it. She was thrilled by the idea and we had a lot of fun coming up with the poses. I loved the campground Mandie suggested, especially the autumn leaves. If it hadn't been 50 degrees by the time we finished, it would have been a perfect night -- haha!

Mandie is delightful to work with, and darn talented, too.  She came back with 120 shots and told me to pick my favorite 10. It wasn't easy. After the first pass I had 40 favorites!

I absolutely love the way they turned out!

Just a few things from November

November went by fast. That happens when you spend half of it out of town. Hooray for epic vacations and holidays with family!

Here are the very few non-vacation related things deemed worthy of documentation (not including stuff I was having too much fun doing to stop and photograph):

We didn't do Pie Night this year. Thank goodness our Thanksgiving buffet offered me plenty of options.

The Lunar Chronicles were my favorite find last year. The final novel was a fantastic wrap up. I read it twice before returning it to the library (800 pages is not a small commitment). Thank you for the recommendation, Kate. I loved it!!

This was how I felt when I finished Winter. You have been warned.

Bought some new dress shoes. I've wanted colorful pumps for ages and they were on sale. Hooray!

I still have glitter all over my car from the Glinda costume I wore at Comic Con and for Halloween. No amount of vacuum will ever cleanse my Evie Elantra. I kinda love it.

December boats big deadlines at work and all sorts of Christmas stuff. It's gonna be good!