Gma’s Christmas

It was finally here! The day that our Mom works all year to get ready for. Christmas & St. Nicholas day!!

I was telling someone the other day just how much our Mom puts into this day and I seriously think it’s about the same as someone who is planning a wedding. See she starts thinking about the next years gifts already in January. I mean who else buys around 60 gifts each year and helps organize the day? Well Ma that’s who! And at 87 years young I’d put her skills up against just about anyones!

So like I said the day was finally here for our family to get all together.The weather wasn’t the warmest, but it also wasn’t snowing or freezing rain –  so all in all it was good.

With the Roadhouse all ready to go, now the food started to roll in. With turkey, ham, dressing, and tons of great food, we always say that if you were hungry during the day – well that’s just your own fault! Here’s a picture of just some of the food for the dinner table so far. We started putting a full size ping pong table over the pool table for serving and it seems to work out the best for us. It still gets a little crowded but we can make it work. 

We had a couple of new guests join us this year I made a point to see if they were OK. When they said that they were doing fine, I reminded them that there was another wave of our family coming in about an hour so be ready! See our family is pretty loud. There are kids playing air hockey in the back of the room, the boys were playing catch football outside, babies and more babies were being passed around, and then the adults are probably the loudest by trying to talk over all of it! That’s just how our family rolls and once you know that – well it’s pretty easy to just blend in. But it can be a little scary at times and even I have to step out once in awhile to catch my breath – so that’s why I kept an eye out for the newcomers to the group 🙂

After dinner and with our bellies full, it was time for a special guest to come and to hear what was all on the kid’s Christmas wish lists. We had some brave little ones that went straight up and sat on his lap, and also some that wasn’t planning on sharing any wish list with anyone, much less St. Nicholas! 

Next it was time for Ma to pass out her gifts to everyone. It was so much fun just to watch both Ma and the kids once it was their time to open their gifts. I have no clue how she does it, but she can pick out the most perfect gift from the oldest to the youngest kid! And to think that I struggle with just a couple of gifts that I need to buy for our family here at the farm. Whew! 

And finally it was the annual Adult Christmas exchange game. It’s the game where you draw a number and you can either open a present or steal someone else’s. We’ve done this game now for quite a few years and with this year having 39 people in it, it was sure to be a blast! And going back to my earlier statement about noise – well it’s never a quiet game! FUN .. but not quiet!

At the end of the night when everyone is packing up and gathering their gifts, empty serving dishes from the dinner, and their kids, it seems like even though it’s a big full day and we’re all kinda tired, I don’t know how it happens but it’s even more fun than last years Christmas! So with a smile on everyone’s face and a Merry Christmas in the air, we all head to different directions once again until the next year comes around.