Christmas is the bestmas!

Christmas Eve is always spent with the Glasseys at the Brown's Christmas party - they've been going for almost 15 years, and one of the main reasons we go back is for Caren's meatballs. Not really - everyone there is old neighborhood buddies and it's fun for them to get together for an update on everyone's life. Caren has everyone bring an item to hang from a wreath that signified your year - it's always fun to look at wreaths from Christmas's past. We left the party and headed home to sleep so we could wait for Santa.


He came!

Christmas morning is always a compromise - the kids (Conor, Megan, Cheryl) would like to get up at 6am, and the adults (Bill, Ann) would like to wake up at 10am, so we usually meet in the middle at 8am. Megan always acts as Santa and makes sure we all have a present for each round. The first round of presents was actually the highlight of the entire day. We go in order from oldest to youngest, so Bilf the Dilf went first - I don't even remember what he opened. Ann went next and opened the book "The Art of Racing in the Rain" which she got from Megie. I blabbed and blabbed and blabbed about it being an awesome book, but I thought it was odd that Ann didn't say much. Conor and I each opened a gift, and then it was Megan. Now remember, Megan plays Santa and doesn't know any of her presents. Megan picked a present from Ann and tore it open - guess what she got! "The Art of Racing in the Rain!" Ann immediately started cracking up - needless to say, Meg and Biff know each other well!





I love opening presents with the Glasseys. Every present is really heartfelt and it's fun to see what they picked out. Board games and books for me, books and baseball stuff for Conor - they always nail it.

We do stockings last in their family, which is always fun. However, this year was an exception. Megan had to go and get her brother this thing - I think her love for her brother outweighed her capacity for the most annoying sound in the world.





After presents and breakfast, Conor and I headed to my mom's house so we could open presents with Denise and the kids - they had a great morning, and Paxton was SO excited about his DSi. He walked in the door and told me "Santa brought me a DSi, but don't worry, Ali and I are going to share!"




This might be the cutest picture Ali has ever let me take - she hates pictures, but she was very excited about her Easy Bake Oven, and I didn't even have to beg for this picture!


That's Denise's boyfriend Neil on the couch - he's British and calls Paper Towels "Kitchen Rolls!" He's a really nice guy!

After presents we all relaxed a bit before we ate an AMAZING dinner prepared by my Mom. I'm pretty spoiled, she loves me a lot - she cooked me a turkey dinner, Thanksgiving style! I can't believe I didn't take a picture of all the food. I was salivating too much. She's good.


Don't worry, this isn't the last picture of Denise sleeping you'll see. This is her couch.

Although Conor & I had already had a crazy day, we weren't ready to be done just yet, so we met up with all of Conor's guy friends at Kelly's house.





It was nice to just sit and hang with the Dudes and their wives/fiancees. We even watched some old videos Kelly had taken their freshman year of college. We headed home after that and I completely fell asleep in the car - this Christmas wiped me out!