Christmas 2012

I think we paid proper homage to 2012 over the Christmas holiday. Thank you to our family who came to help us celebrate. It was a nice ending to the year. I'm glad you all got to spend a little time with Erica before she had to go back to England. She has texted me this morning to let me know she arrived safely in York, and will be spending the rest of the afternoon sleeping. That all night flight to London is a bit rough for those of us who never sleep on planes. I think what she was trying to say in a nice way is, "I'm fine, I need sleep. Do NOT call and wake me!". LOL!

The funny thing, well 1 funny thing about this family Christmas was how our house shrank so quickly. Bruce and I are always kicking around the idea of downsizing since 3 bedrooms, formal rooms and a couple of bathrooms go virtually untouched for most of the year. But bring in an extra 11 people and suddenly we start wondering how we ever survived these tight, cramped conditions. LOL! And Stephen and Hannia live in town and didn't even sleep here. I started entertaining thoughts of UP-sizing, but since it is rare that all of us get together in 1 space, I probably won't.

Some of the high points of our holiday were:

- First and foremost, having Erica at home for the first time in over a year!!!

- The 3 day bonfire! Seriously, it would die down at bedtime but people would go throw logs on the bed of ashes in the afternoon and it just kept going and going. Fun!

- The SHARK! Bruce had pointed out a well designed post hole digger at Lowes back in the fall. Since he loves tools, I picked it up for Christmas. I asked Stephen and Hannia if they could come up with some creative way to wrap this thing, and they did an amazing job of creating a large gift wrapped shark that was the highlight of this Year's gift wrapping.

- The FOOD! Calvin cooked us lovely things for Breakfast! Greg made French Toast for Christmas brunch (which we washed down with cranberry mimosas, yum). And Stephen and Hannia cooked a turkey and homemade biscuits on Christmas night. Jeanne made turtles, Greg made chocolate coconut chews, Stephen baked a cake, and Calvin made sausage balls.....there was too much food to list it all. But thank you all for such a wonderful 3 day long feast! There will be dieting in the near future...LOL!

Anyway, it was a nice holiday. There are tons of pictures and I will share some later. We have been so busy that I haven't even had time to check them out yet. Now it's time to get serious about ringing in the New Year, setting goals, and prioritizing life's important stuff. I hope 2013 is wonderful for ALL of us!