On the Eve of Christmas

What a wonderful, busy night we've had! And it's not over yet.

Our family has a yearly Christmas Eve tradition of making Oyster Stew. It's a disgusting concoction that only a handful of family members will actually eat--the rest of us are content with pizza, chicken noodle soup, or chili. We had so many desserts tonight it was shameful. Check out this buffet of calories: raspberry Fluff, strawberry pretzel dessert, chocolate preztel drops complete with m&ms, white macadema nut cookies, chocolate chip cookies, chocolate pie, and cocunut cream pie.

After dinner (and too much snacking) it was time to open gifts. There are eight grandkids in the family. By the time each set of aunts & uncles and grandpa buy for them, they're beyond spoiled. I'm not even sure what all my boys got. I played Santa and had a hard time keeping up with the demands of the over-eager little people. My son is the oldest at six and our youngest is 18 months. Madness I tell you. Utter, absolute, heart-warming madness.

After presents it was time to play. The adults settled in for a game of Catch Phrase (we love this game!) while the kids tried out all their new toys.

Because it was getting late and everyone was leaving, I handed out the reindeer food and took my boys out into our front lawn to sprinkle the glitter/oat mixture onto the six (maybe eight) inches of snow. Of course, it was more than just my boys out there; three of my nephews had to help.

Then it was time to say goodbye to everyone and have the boys open the traditional Christmas Eve gifts. Yep, you guessed it, new pajamas!! This year's seletion was Yu-Gi-Oh jammies in green for KC and red for Gage.

Now its time for Mommy and Daddy to wait for Santa Claus to arrive...

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