Family Christmas Party

Our annual "Smart Family Christmas Party" was held on Friday, January 9th, while Jeff, Nicole, and Michael were home from Wisconsin. I had planned to include photos on this blog but this particular party was held in the dark. We had an 8 hour power outage that day so most of our party was spent packed into Daran's family room with a battery-operated lantern providing a little bit of light.

We managed to eat warmed up french dip thanks to Daran's camp chef stove in his garage and opened up gifts barely before total darkness. I coudn't even read the tags on my gifts to the family.

However, it was still fun and was definitely a party we won't soon forget. The grandkids had a blast with each other, which was the most important. The noise level probably reached well over 100 decibels, but who wants to keep their hearing anyway? LoriAnn is a saint for always volunteering her home for our gatherings. It always manages to get trashed!

Next year I've simply got to do things differently. WHY DO I PROCRASTINATE??? As usual, I was finishing up Christmas for the family the morning of the party. Problem is, I had Kamryn's quilt 3/4 bound, and was pinning the final side, when the power went off at noon. By 3:00, when the party was supposed to start at 3:30, I finally decided the quilt wouldn't get done. Well, we've had Kamryn in our family since May and I've known I would do her a quilt. What happened to last summer, or at least this fall? Sometimes I drive myself crazy!!! I did great-great grandparent histories for my kids and they, too, were finished the day before the party.

The main gift we gave the family was a family photo which turned out great! Everyone looked great, but it was a combination of 6 different photos, one of each family.

Anyway, Christmas has come and gone again and now I am putting away the decorations for another year. It will seem like about 3 months when it is time to get them out again. It was great being with Jeff, Nicole, and that darling baby Michael. We miss them so much!!! Hopefully they'll be living closer in 1.5 years when he is through with school.

HAPPY NEW YEAR 2009!!!