I'll Be Home For Christmas...

At least the Chinese delegation made it home to Utah and we were excited about that. After long hours on the plane and at airports, Will, Taylor and Jen arrived from China. They have been plagued with jet lag throughout the week but they preservere and work at keeping a full schedule.

The evening they arrived we had Jen's parents and brother, Ben, for dinner.

The next day they spent quite awhile organizing their jean collection. I just call them the "jean machine."

Taylor and Jen spent Christmas Eve with Jen's family. We headed north to Hilary and Adam's.

We tried not to overindulge on Rueben sandwiches, shrimp dip, potato salad, wassail, etc. but we just couldn't seem to help ourselves. Once again, "we ate too much."

Grandma P read a couple of Christmas stories. Then we read Luke's account of Christ's birth and sang our favorite Christmas carols.

There were a few people who opened up some Christmas Eve gifts which surprisingly turned out to be pajamas. The girls even received matching outfits for their dolls. They were so cute and cozy. Adam insisted that Hilary open a package too. Wow, pajamas!

When the kids were off to bed, the next phase of the evening began. The neighbor texted Hilary right after Taylor and Jen pulled into the driveway. "Can I come and try on jeans? I just can't wait. I'm so excited." She arrived within minutes. Shortly thereafter her husband arrived. She tried on jeans. I continued to wrap gifts for all, including the jeans. Her husband and Taylor do the "Tim Tam slam." It turned out to be a very late night for all especially Britton since he couldn't get to sleep until almost 3 a.m.

The kids were up by 6:30 but the parents managed to hold them off until about 7:15. Everyone except Will helped create a giant paper mess.

Fortunately Will slept in a little longer. When he woke up, we were able to focus on him. He was so fun.

Korinne loves her new outfit with a matching one for her dolly. Adam tried on the sweater and didn't take it off for hours. I guess he likes it okay.

I put the wassail back on the stove to warm up while we opened presents. It boiled over so we took turns working to clean up the mess throughout the day. Hilary and Adam are working hard to convert us into Aggie fans so Steve has a new hat, which he loves. I have a new Aggie tee-shirt.

Hilary kept trying to clean up the paper mountain while the kids took a break from toys to watch a cartoon with Will. He got to watch in English this time. He usually watches his cartoons in Chinese.

Hilary creates her yummy 7-layer Mexican dip. We also had our traditional breakfast ring earlier in the morning. Adam's super duper delicious rolls are pretty much the most important part of the Christmas dinner.

We couldn't resist the urge to barbecue since it was sunny and warm for northern Utah--in the mid 40's. So Steve barbecued ribs. We've never had ribs for Christmas dinner before, but they were so-oo good. Jenna's comment was "It's just like spring out there." With only a few random piles of snow, it felt almost like spring. We wore coats for our walk earlier, but by lunch time, Steve grilled in his shirt sleeves.

Taylor's enjoying the ribs. Jen's going for the yams. Everyone loved the twice-baked potatoes and Adam's special Christmas jello.

Nice color, texture, variety and Polish pottery.

We left at sunset for our drive back home. The next day was our last week with our cherished sunday school class. Only one of our students is staying with us next year. The rest are moving up to the next class. We will really miss them. They are great kids.
The next day after church we drove south for a family Christmas party with my Dad, Ann and their posterity. Even with a lot of people missing, it was a good-sized crowd. Here Jon reads the Christmas story from the bible. Grandpa and Grandma K and a lot of the little ones dressed in costume.

Here my siblings and spouses make fools of ourselves with a Rudolph game devised by Eli and Vanessa.

Some families came quite a distance--Jon and Shalane from Long Island, NY and Tay and Jen from China. There were lots of new babies. It was fun to see them all and fortunately they were angels. None of them fussed or wailed.