Christmas Day…

For the past few years, we go to Karen’s for Christmas Day, eat a wonderful ham dinner, then go see a movie. This year turned out a little different. First, we still went to Karen’s, but she didn’t make a ham, which I was really looking forward to, instead, she made a roast. Now the roast was very good, but I just had my taste buds all set for ham. Oh well. Second, we didn’t go to a movie, because the theater doubled in price from the previous years and the only movie we wanted to see was at a bad time. So, we played Texas Holdem! What a hoot! I’m not much of a card player at any time and poker isn’t any different. I was sort of getting the hang of it though, but my Mom, my 90 year old Mom, she held her own. Ethan was helping us for awhile, but she really didn’t need all that much help. Figures huh?!

Later on that night, we had a bonfire on our new patio. David and Ethan shoveled off a big area and got the wood going. Andy made up a batch of his delicious Margaritas. Oh man those are good! A bunch of Ethan’s and Andy’s friends came over for several hours and talked and drank and generally had a great time. I really like all of their friends, they’re fun and nice and don’t make me feel like I’m an ‘old lady’. I wish I had friends like that when I was young. Heck, I wish I had friends like that now, but that’s another story.

Christmas Eve…

I hadn’t seen Andy in 7 months. I had to work on Christmas Eve day, so I didn’t get to pick him up at the airport, which was probably good, because his friends did something pretty cool. They were dressed up and had a sign with Andy’s name on it like they do in the movies for people who don’t have anyone they know to pick them up. Actually, I saw a guy at the Phoenix airport with a sign. Then they went out to breakfast. So I didn’t get to see him until our Christmas Eve church service was almost over. We were humming Silent Night and walking out of church with our lit candles and in the very back pew sat Andy, looking all cute and Andy like with his black wool jacket and scarf, little scruff on his chin, holding a candle and smiling. I blew out my candle in the Narthex, turned around, went back in church and gave him a hug. I told him he would probably be safe making a break for it. I guess I taught him right, because he waited a little bit longer before sneaking out. After a couple more hugs, we hung around a bit to have cookies and punch and to let some other people say Hi.

We got home and put together all the food and drinks while waiting for the others to stop by. We had hard and soft tacos and chips and salsa, cheese and crackers and of course cookies. Andy was disappointed that we had tacos and not prime rib, but we never have a big meal on Christmas eve, never had and probably never will. We have our big meal on Christmas Day!

We took our time chatting and eating, trying to waste time until Ethan got home from work. He was to get off at 8 pm, but it ended up being a bit later. Once he got home, we Skyped Kira and proceeded to open up presents.  Kira’s boyfriend John was with her at the time, so he got to meet all of us and see how strange we are, but then, aren’t all families strange? We had a really nice Christmas eve. We got to have Ethan at home, we got to have Andy back at home and we got to visit with Kira complements of technology.